Burn the Heart Out of You
by Jennistar1
Summary: SPOILERS FOR THE FINAL EPISODE, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED. Sherlock has not backed off. Moriarty follows through on his threat.
1. The Game Is On

**Title:** Burn The Heart Out Of You - Part One: The Game Is On

**Author:** starjenni

**Disclaimer: **Not mine!

**Pairings:** Eventual Sherlock/John, and implied Sherlock/Moriarty if you read upside down and squint.

**Warnings: **Dark, dark happenings.

**Rating:** T

**Spoilers: SPOILERS FOR THE LAST EPISODE. DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED IT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.**

**Summary:** Sherlock has not backed off. Moriarty follows through on his threat. How much of Sherlock must he destroy before Sherlock lets him go?

* * *

**Part One - The Game is On**

He can see sparkles.

They hover in the air, on the floor, on the walls, everywhere, sparkles of white and blue and black, and he is surrounded by them on all sides, and he can hear water, and it is all closing in, closing in on him, everything is closing in -

And then there is the voice.

"_We were made for each other, Sherlock."_

That damned _voice_. That stupid, ridiculous, immature, almost amusing and by god _dangerous_ voice. Crowing above the sparkles and sounds of water. _"Hi!"_

And then he blinks and he is there again, standing by a pool of sparkles and darkness, and that man is standing in front of him, that small, neat, well dressed man, that man with eyes of utter darkness and a smile like a knife blade.

"_Back off,"_ he is saying, but Sherlock is moving closer to him, even though he has no weapon, even though there is no logical reason for doing so, he is moving closer to this _danger_, and the man is laughing, his cold, silly laugh, and it is echoing through the sparkles, and yet still Sherlock advances.

"No," he hears himself say. "God, no."

Moriarty smiles happily.

"_Then,"_ he whispers, _"I will burn the heart out of you."_

The pool explodes.

* * *

Sherlock jerks up and, as a result, almost falls off the sofa, and has to scrabble wildly in the air to regain his purchase. Someone in the background says "Sherlock - ", but it is only when he is once more clinging to the sofa arm that he is able to look up. John is standing by the fridge in his pyjamas, holding a bottle of milk and raising an eyebrow. It must have been the sound of the fridge door shutting that made the noise of his dream explosion, Sherlock deduces, and he coughs and straightens himself up to a sitting position.

"Are you all right?" asks John.

The room is covered in papers, concerning everything from London schools to car registration forms. Sherlock has been hunting down every source of information he can find, ringing every contact he can, has spent every last waking moment reading up for any leads he can find on one _James Moriarty _and every sleeping moment revisiting that moment where the self same man told him, quite bluntly, that he was going to destroy him.

"I'm fine," he says.

It has been two weeks and he has found nothing.

"Tea?" John offers. Sherlock glances up at the clock. It is half past three in the morning. Evidently he is not the only one with something on his mind.

"Please," he says.

They sit amongst the beakers and poisons littering the kitchen table, in various states of disarray, and the birds are starting to sing outside, and the stream of traffic is getting louder. John is sipping at his tea. Sherlock is staring at his, purposefully ignoring the litter of papers lurking in the corner of his eye. His mouth feels furry and his eyes are aching. He can't remember the last time he went outside, or even _looked_ outside.

This is driving him insane.

"You're not like him," says John suddenly.

Sherlock looks up abruptly from his tea, staring at John through the poisons. John is watching him intently, has been for a while, and yet Sherlock has not noticed. This obsession is making him lose his touch.

"Yes, I am," he replies quietly. Because he is. Very much like that dark-eyed, dark-minded man. Too much. He is willing to let people die just so that he cannot be bored. He is willing to do anything, _anything_ for a bit of fun. He wants Moriarty alive because the world would be flat and dull without his carefully arranged murders.

John picks at something on his pyjama sleeve. "No," he says steadily. "You're not."

Sherlock does not bother responding. John is wrong.

* * *

"_No one ever gets to me. And no one ever will."_

He is lying on the floor amongst the papers, and the curtains are closed but there is a tiny stream of light flickering through the darkness, and it is annoying him, but he is too preoccupied to get up and sort it out. There is no birth certificate, there is nobody called James Moriarty, there is nothing, there is nothing, there is _nothing._ So he changed his name. But other checks, more illegal checks, have provided him still with nothing. He has no clue. And Sherlock with no clues is lost.

"_People have died."_

"_That's what people DO!"_

_The scream echoed around the swimming pool. The scream echoed through him. Because he'd said that earlier, hadn't he, to John, he had said something like that before…_

"_Try to remember there's a woman who might die."_

"_What for?"_

_He doesn't care. What does he care? All he cares about is the thrill of the chase. The thrill of the case._

_John is so wrong. He _is _like him._

His phone is ringing. No, wait. Not _his _phone. The pink one.

It is sitting on the edge of the table nearby and it is _ringing_, rattling insistently against the desk.

He stands up, slowly. The phone does not stop. The number is withheld, as it always is. It must be him. It _has_ to be him.

He looks around the room, carefully, as if by doing so he may find Moriarty lurking in one of the darkened corners, or find a bomb ticking away unobtrusively somewhere, waiting for him to pick up the phone and end it all. But of course there is not, there was never going to be, and the phone is still ringing, so he picks it up.

There is silence on the other end. "Hello," he says warily.

"_Hi!_" chirps that voice at the other end, that _voice_, the voice on the brink of insanity. For a moment, he is back at the pool, in a world of sparkles and light and burning.

"Oh," he tries to say casually. "So you're using your _own_ voice this time."

The voice shudders again into that shade of darkness, that tiny indication of the absolutely immense _malevolence _that is lurking beneath it. "I thought you would like to hear it. Since I'm sure you think about it _so _often, am I right Sherlock? Do you think about me? Do you _dream_ about me?"

And he's actually _breathless_, breathless with overwhelming hatred and…yes, and fear. Moriarty can read him as effortlessly as he can read the rest of the world. He has never known anyone to do it to him before - oh, there is Mycroft of course, but Mycroft has always been more subtle, certainly more subtle than _Sherlock _will ever be, and always knew when _not _to say certain things, when to leave the person with the incorrect notion that their thoughts are their own. But this man…this man can take him apart in a single phone call. Is this how people think about Sherlock all the time? Is this how wary they feel around him, how intimidated? He must be _hideous _to be around.

"What do you want," he says and, try though he might, his voice shivers a little on the last syllable.

Moriarty is as unlikely to miss this as he is. He laughs delightedly, setting Sherlock's teeth on edge.

"Have you found anything on me yet?" he asks, in a mockery of polite conversational tones. "Bet it's been driving you _crazy_, hasn't it Sherlock, to find nothing? Doesn't it drive you _mad?_"

"What the _hell_ do you want?" Sherlock snaps. His hand is shaking on the phone now, and he hates it, he hates it. Nobody should terrify him like this. No one should send his pulse into overdrive like this. Not him.

"I warned you," Moriarty's disembodied voice says, finally, _finally_ cold. "I said _back off,_ Sherlock, do you remember? And yet I hear things, things which _upset _me, Sherlock. And I…well, I _really _don't like being upset."

Sherlock can't help but laugh. There is nothing else he can do. "Did you _ever _imagine I would leave this?"

"Perhaps," Moriarty says. "If you were sensible. I thought you might be. But you are not." His voice drops into a snarl, a primitive animal noise that weakens Sherlock's knees. "Don't think I won't do what I said, Sherlock. _I will burn you._"

Sherlock glances over at the papers strewn across the dark floor. He wants to kill this man, and yet he cannot help but love this, all of it, every second, and the thought both chills and thrills him.

"Just try it," he says, and hangs up.

* * *

John arrives to find Sherlock sitting in the dark amongst hundreds of papers, his face the colour of cheese, or off milk. He is staring at the opposite wall, and one glance at him tells John that he is thousands of miles away.

It's the pink phone lying in one limp hand that tells John what has happened.

"He rang," he says.

Sherlock doesn't say anything, but a nervous tick in his cheek tells John all he really needs to know.

John presses his lips together. He could say _Sherlock, do what he says and leave him alone_ or _Sherlock, this will kill you, for god's sake_ but it would be like screaming for help in the middle of an ocean. Pointless. Hopeless.

He sighs and goes into the kitchen to unpack the shopping.

* * *

Lestrade rings Sherlock the next day, and Sherlock enters John's room only to pluck him up from the computer and throw his coat at him.

"British Museum. C'mon."

And with that, they're off in the next cab, and John is hoping that possibly, just possibly, this means that Sherlock has been sensible and indeed has moved on like John couldn't quite suggest.

This is not, however, the case, as John realises when they enter the museum and Lestrade is there, holding a pale envelope in his hand and an air of resigned desperation.

"For you," he says, neatly depositing the envelope in Sherlock's hand. John is expecting Sherlock to examine this envelope as closely as he did the previous one, which held his pink phone, but he barely glances at the name before he is ripping it unceremoniously open.

On the letter inside is written only two words.

_Last chance._

"What the hell does that mean?" Lestrade asks, but Sherlock has gone deathly pale again, and John is too busy worrying if he's going to have to deal with a fainting man to tell Lestrade what he suspects.

"Where did you find this?" Sherlock whispers.

"_The Rosetta Stone?_" John says incredulously. "The - the actual - ?"

"_Yes,_" says Dr. Williams, the pushy, short-tempered curator of the museum, apparently sick of telling people the same information over and over again, especially facts this reputation-damaging. "Someone has taken the Rosetta Stone, okay? Right. _Brilliant_."

It is impossible, but the proof is there, a large glass case and an emptiness where the Rosetta Stone used to be. John has come to see it, once or twice. It has always been surrounded by four or five layers of tourists, all taking photos of whatever piece of it they can see from their vantage point. The staff have closed off this area now, and the lack of people is just a little unnerving.

"No one heard anything," the curator is saying. "No one noticed anything. None of the security alarms were tripped, and we have many of them, all new, all fully functioning. CCTV shows that simply one second it is there, the next it isn't. The glass case is completely intact."

"Intact?" John blurts out. "You mean - ?"

Dr. Williams shrugs. "Somehow they took the entire thing without once touching the case."

Lestrade is scribbling notes to one side. "We found no fingerprints, no footprints, no eyewitness accounts whatsoever. It's like it simply vanished."

John stares at the empty case. He can see Sherlock through it, bundled up in his great coat, arms folded, face still a sickly colour.

He moves round to where Sherlock is standing; the man's mouth is moving but John can't hear what he is saying, he is mouthing the words.

"Moriarty, do you think?" he asks.

"Definitely," says Sherlock, apparently surveying every inch of the glass at once.

John huffs, mind working in overdrive. "And the letter?"

"A test." Sherlock's voice has adopted that faraway tone he has. "If I take the case, he will do it."

John frowns. "Do what?"

The look Sherlock gives him is cold and utterly intense and terrifying. "Burn the heart out of me," he says.


	2. The Unsolvable Case

**Title:** Burn The Heart Out Of You - Part Two: The Unsolvable Case

**Author:** starjenni

**Disclaimer: **Not mine!

**Pairings:** Eventual Sherlock/John, and implied Sherlock/Moriarty if you read upside down and squint.

**Warnings: **Dark, dark happenings.

**Rating:** T

**Spoilers: SPOILERS FOR THE LAST EPISODE. DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED IT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.**

**Summary:** Sherlock has not backed off. Moriarty follows through on his threat. How much of Sherlock must he destroy before Sherlock lets him go?

* * *

_I have no idea how well this part went, first it was dreadful, then it was okay, and now I am confused, confused, confused! Reviews are loved (they're always loved/adored/occasionally licked) but especially for this part!_

**Part Two - The Unsolvable Case**

They're sitting in a cheap Chinese, at a sticky table in a murky corner, munching their silent way through egg-fried rice and chow mein, and it is a while before Sherlock speaks.

Eventually he says, "I'm taking the case."

John stares at him, chopsticks raised halfway to his mouth.

"_What?_"

"I said I'm taking the case."

The noodles that John has clenched between his chopsticks falls greasily back onto his plate, but he apparently doesn't notice. "Are you _mad?_" he snaps.

Sherlock leans across the grimy table urgently. "How can I pass up a case like this?" he hisses. "No clues, no leads, John this is _fascinating_."

"This is going to get you _killed_," retorts John ruthlessly. "Or have you forgotten the letter? For God's sake, Sherlock, he's doing this on _purpose_ - "

"Don't you think I know that?" They're both whispering now, quickly, harshly, as if Moriarty is somehow lurking behind a corner, listening in intently. "But I _can't_ leave this case."

They stare at each other, eyeballing each other, and John cannot read Sherlock, has never been able to, and it angers him.

He sits back, glaring. "You're bloody insane," he says frankly. "You are. You're _enjoying _this, aren't you, this danger?"

Sherlock says nothing. John shakes his head and dives back into his noodles. "You deserve each other," he mutters, but Sherlock gives no signs of hearing him.

* * *

One and a half weeks later finds Sherlock sitting in his chair, one hand on his head, the other holding his violin bow which he is using to ineffectively _thwack_ at various pieces of his paper on his desk. John, who is sitting at the desk, attempting painfully to write his blog, is by now getting a bit sick of this. When the next blow comes, _very_ close to his elbow, he seizes the bow with his military-trained, lightening fast reactions, and wrestles it out of Sherlock's hand.

Sherlock pouts.

"I can't think."

"Well," John says patiently, carefully lying the bow down on the opposite side of the table. "Hitting me with a violin bow isn't exactly going to help, is it?"

Sherlock groans and wrests himself out of his chair, pacing over to the opposite wall, which is covered with facts, data, information about anything and everything.

"This is ridiculous," he says softly, his fingers running over the different pinned up pieces of paper. "I've done everything, checked everything, looked into the history of the security guards on duty, researched other thefts in the museum's past, thefts in the area, I've checked the damned glass case over and _over_, I've watched the CCTV so much I'm repeating it in my sleep, and there is _nothing._"

There is a deep silence. John taps out a few more words on his keyboard before he is aware of it, and then glances up over his screen. Sherlock is sitting on the edge of the sofa, head in his hands, his fingers tangling into his hair. There are heavy bags under his eyes and he is so thin, surely he was never this thin when John first met him? He is fading away, tortured into dust by Moriarty. It is destroying him, John thinks, a lump suddenly forming in his throat, destroying Sherlock to rack his brains for a solution, wait for another call, the pink phone never far from his side. Moriarty is dogging his steps without being anywhere near him, and it feels as though Sherlock is simply waiting for the world to fall into flames around him.

"You haven't slept in ages," says John, because he hasn't. "And you need to eat - "

Sherlock hurls a nearby magazine to the ground. "_That's not the problem!_ I always do that on a case, that isn't the problem, the problem is - "

He stops and suddenly straightens, staring at his fingers.

"The problem," he says very quietly. "Is that this is an unsolvable case."

John feels his blood turn to ice, every vein freezing into solid lines across his body. He stares at Sherlock. "Unsolvable?"

Sherlock glances up, and they lock eyes. He nods, quietly. "Unsolvable," he affirms. "If I can't solve this, who can? And I can't solve this. I can't, John."

John is so used to a Sherlock who can solve everything, a Sherlock who dashes around, barking out results, calling everyone else idiots, revelling in his own genius, that the sight of this Sherlock, a defeated Sherlock, a _lost_ Sherlock, paralyses him into silence.

"I've never been bested before," Sherlock continues flatly, as if he feels as numb as John. "Never." He stares at John, as if he is lost in a stormy sea and John is his only anchor. "_Who the hell is this man?_" he asks.

John can say nothing.

* * *

Sherlock is in the lab at Barts when his phone - _his_ phone, not that pink monstrosity which seems to prey on his mind constantly these days - rings insistently. He is in the middle of attempting to identify the fabric of a coat for one of his lesser cases, and tuts at the interruption, but since John isn't here to pick up his phone for him, he resigns himself to doing the hard work himself and reaches into his pocket for it.

It is Lestrade.

"You'll never believe it," says Lestrade. "The Rosetta Stone's turned up again."

Sherlock checks himself, then straightens up in his chair.

"Where?" he demands.

"Right where it was," Lestrade says. "Smack bang in the middle of its case. Once again the CCTV shows nothing - it's not there one second, the next second it is. And once again we've found nothing, no fingerprints, no signs of entry - "

"_Hi!_" chirps a voice behind Sherlock, and he freezes. There is no mistaking that voice. There never will be.

He cuts Lestrade off mid-stream, places the phone carefully on the table, and reaches slowly to the drawer on his right.

"No, no, _no_," says Moriarty sharply. "No guns, please."

Sherlock grits his teeth and moves around on his chair. Moriarty is standing in the doorway, leaning nonchalantly against the doorframe, and grinning widely. If it wasn't for the ever-present and ever-cold malice in his black eyes, he would almost seem happy to see Sherlock.

He opens the front of his own perfectly tailored jacket to reveal that he, too, is not armed.

"No guns," he says again. "See? Let's just…" He walks into the room, letting the door slam with an unnerving finality. "Chat."

He smiles again, but it is the bitter predatory smile of a shark. Sherlock looks around the room, taking everything in in one glance, but, of course, the only exit is being blocked by Moriarty. He warily stands up from his chair, circling slowly around the table.

"Nice trick with the Rosetta Stone," he says, battling to sound casual. "How did you do it?"

Moriarty snorts. "Yeah, like I'd tell you."

"Why not?"

"Because if I don't, the case will haunt you into insanity, _my dear_."

And it will. Sherlock knows this, just as starkly as Moriarty does. It will stalk him forever, be in the back of his mind forever, it will be there, always there, it will be the last thought in his mind when he dies.

Sherlock smiles, fleetingly, sharply. "Is that how you're going to do it, then? _Burn me_, I mean? By giving me unsolvable cases?"

Moriarty's smile drops. "No," he says simply. "That would merely crush you. Depress you until you're just a shadow of yourself. No, no. Tut _tut, _Sherlock- that's not all I want." His lip twitches, his face falling into a cold, burning blankness. "I want to _burn _you, Sherlock Holmes," he says. "I want to _crush _you, and then _burn _you, and then stamp your remains into _dust_ with all the hatred I have and ever _will _have for you."

For a moment, he can't breathe. Sherlock has experienced all kinds of dislike and distaste before, from those he works with, from those he catches. But he has never, in all his life, experienced such raw, unbridled, _destructive _hatred before, a hatred so intense that it will plough through walls, plough through people, plough through Sherlock's own _head _to get what it wants. It is terrifying, it is terrifying, and the most terrifying thing about it is how _exciting_ it is.

"I've come to tell you," Moriarty continues, as casually as if he is discussing the weather, as if he has not just threatened Sherlock into breathlessness. "If you continue this, Sherlock, there _will _be deaths."

"And you expect me to care, do you?" Sherlock throws out. And it's true, he doesn't. What are a few lives to this…this _fascination?_ They are nothing. Necessary sacrifices. _This _is what is important, this right here, his heart hammering in his chest, his throat closed up, his mind whirling in a thousand different directions at once. _This_ is his drug, and he would let cities die to have more, more, more.

But there is something in his head, something intangible, a strange, small whisper in the darkness that has not been there before, and something twangs painfully in his chest.

He turns away, his stomach lurching.

Moriarty seems apparently, suddenly delighted. "Of _course_ you care," he crows - _how did he see it?_ "Oh!" He claps his hands together. "This is wonderful. Brilliant! John Watson really has had quite an effect on you, hasn't he?"

Sherlock's heart stops.

"Keep away from him," he snarls, whirling back around, all semblance of indifference gone. "Keep the _hell_ away from him."

Moriarty's smile returns, this time blazing bright as the sun. "Get out of my way and I will," he retorts.

He can't help it, here is Moriarty practically declaring a death sentence, and yet he cannot just…_let it go._ "Not a chance," he chokes out.

Moriarty shrugs. "Then I'll just keep destroying you," he says cheerfully.

Sherlock looks at him, really looks at him, he looks into those black, chaos-filled eyes, concentrating even while his skin is crawling.

"My god," he murmurs. "You _are _insane."

Moriarty's eyes flick up to his face, and Sherlock sees his own reflection stare back at him.

"Says _you_," Moriarty retorts calmly. "I'm destroying you and you _love it._"

Sherlock doesn't know how to respond, and Moriarty knows it, because he is gone in a moment, in a flash, and Sherlock is left wondering if that scene happened at all or if he imagined it, if Moriarty has finally worked his way into his brain and left him imagining his own world.

* * *

Sherlock is even worse than when John left him, this time, and John can't quite convince himself that it is just the news of the reappeared Rosetta Stone that has caused it. He is sitting with his eyes fixed to his microscope, but his fingers are nervously drumming on the tabletop, and John is unable to ignore the fact that his shoulders are shaking.

"Dinner?" he asks, because asking if Sherlock is all right would be a waste of breath.

* * *

"You're afraid of him, aren't you?" John says in the taxi on the way to the restaurant. He wasn't going to say anything but Sherlock's face, it's pallor, noticeable even under the streetlights flickering past them, prompts him into speech. He's trying not to let his worry show, but it is building up in him, bubbling inside his throat, and he can't do it, he can't.

Sherlock doesn't say anything, but something in his face sets, and John knows he is right.

"I've never seen you afraid of anyone," he says. "I didn't think you could do afraid."

He can tell from the reflection of Sherlock's eyes in the taxi window that Sherlock didn't think he could either.

* * *

Sherlock is mostly silent through dinner and John doesn't prompt him, doesn't know how to, where to even begin.

They are halfway though (which is at least an improvement, usually John is only just getting started eating when Sherlock hauls him away), when Sherlock suddenly stiffens and says,

"Do you smell that?"

John pauses. "What?"

Sherlock sniffs. "Burning."

John sniffs too, he can smell something but it is quite faint. "Someone in the kitchen probably burnt something - Sherlock?"

Because Sherlock is not listening, and now he's staring out of the restaurant window, and his face is white. "Oh no," he whispers.

John glances out of the window, notices a plume of smoke billowing into London's night sky, but before he can inquire, Sherlock is on his feet and dashing out of the restaurant.

John swears and follows him, knowing that they do this far too often to be healthy, but when he gets outside, Sherlock's expression is so pained that he cannot bring himself to complain. "What is it?" he asks instead.

Sherlock's eyes are following the plume of smoke; the smell is stronger now they are outside.

"John," he says hoarsely. "It's coming from Baker Street."

They stare at each for a breathless moment, then both break into a run.

The smoke gets stronger the closer they get to Baker Street, and then, and John will never, never in his life forget it, they turn a corner and they are there and -

221 Baker Street is burning.

And Sherlock's face is stricken.

"_Mrs Hudson,_" he says.


	3. Not His Fault

**Title:** Burn The Heart Out Of You - Part Three: Not His Fault

**Author:** starjenni

**Disclaimer: **Not mine!

**Pairings:** Eventual Sherlock/John, and implied Sherlock/Moriarty if you read upside down and squint.

**Warnings: **Dark, dark happenings. SWEARING, for this chapter.

**Rating:** T

**Spoilers: SPOILERS FOR THE LAST EPISODE. DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED IT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED**

**Summary:** Sherlock has not backed off. Moriarty follows through on his threat. How much of Sherlock must he destroy before Sherlock lets him go?

_Thank you so so much for your lovely reviews, and please don't kill me when you find out what I've done in this chapter! XD_

* * *

**Part Three: Not His Fault**

_The smoke gets stronger the closer they get to Baker Street, and then, and John will never, never in his life forget it, they turn a corner and they are there and -_

_221 Baker Street is burning._

_And Sherlock's face is stricken._

_"Mrs Hudson," he says._

_

* * *

_

221 Baker Street is burning, and though firemen are swarming around it, it is obvious that the fire is too far gone to be contained now.

And _Mrs Hudson…_

Time has suddenly slowed down, and for a moment John's mind goes blank and he can only stare at Sherlock, and Sherlock at he.

And then it's as if there is a signal blaring out that only they can hear, and they simultaneously turn and start pushing and shoving their way through the small crowd of people that is building up, elbowing their way towards the blazing building, fiercely, hastily, panicking and trying not to. By the time they've reached the front of the crowd, Sherlock looks so pale that John decides he had better take over, and seizes a nearby policeman.

"Excuse me, this is our place - I mean, we're the tenants, we - " but the policeman is already waving them under the barrier and is taking them across the debris-covered ground to an inspector who John hasn't seen before, and the policeman is explaining quickly to the inspector, and John can see that Sherlock has been momentarily distracted by the burning building that was once his home, and John fights not to get distracted either - the flames are dangerously hypnotic. His heart is pounding so hard that he can barely hear the sound of the fire over it.

The inspector is shaking his hand, and John can faintly hear himself say, "John Watson, Sherlock Holmes - we - our landlady, Mrs Hudson - "

A grave look appears on the inspector's face, and John knows exactly what sort of expression that is, because he has had to show the same one to relatives of patients many times before, relatives of patients he could not save, and - _oh no. _

His heart beats so quickly that he wonders if he is going to have a heart attack.

Sherlock's gloved fingers slide silently into the crook of John's arm, and cling on so tightly that John knows he is going to have bruises tomorrow.

The inspector says, "I'm sorry, gentlemen but…we found a body."

John's breath escapes him in one long _huff_; behind him, Sherlock makes a small, weak noise.

The inspector is still so sombre. "We still have the body here," he says, "If one of you wanted to identify it for us - to make sure - "

John knows, without even looking behind him, that Sherlock - genius mastermind though he is - is not up to this. His arm is going numb from the grip Sherlock has on him, and he can feel his shaking from here, the tremor of Sherlock's sleeve against his arm.

"I'll go," he says. Sherlock releases his arm, which John is relieved about, because he didn't want to have to tell him to let go. He glances behind him at Sherlock, but does not say anything, of course because he does not want to patronise him, he doesn't want to talk down to him, but also because there is no need to, Sherlock knows what he _wants _to say, what he _cannot_, and just nods, letting John go and turning his gaze back to the burning house.

* * *

The building is ablaze, violently, dramatically, _viciously_ ablaze, and Sherlock cannot bear to watch but also cannot bear to tear his eyes away. He knows Moriarty has done this, of _course _he has, and even if Sherlock didn't know Moriarty existed, he would know it - he can _feel_ it, he can _see _it, the malice in the flames, the insane, ravenous, gleeful malevolence spitting into the air, swallowing his home whole with greedy abandon. The crackle of the flames is mocking laughter, the red-orange glow a grating, gloating smile, the heat on his face a burning slap. This fire is Moriarty, this fire is Moriarty at his best and at his worst, at his most spectacular.

_I will burn the heart out of you._

The building is falling into blood and rubble, and Sherlock did this, he did this, he has done this -

The pink phone in his hand beeps; he almost does not want to look at it, but he is Sherlock Holmes, and he has always been so curious, and so he does.

It is a text message. It reads: _BYE BYE MRS HUDSON._

He turns around immediately, quickly, hastily, scanning the crowds of people painfully, but he can't see him anywhere, cannot see that stupid-faced man in his stupid suit lounging in the background, cannot see those flaming dark eyes staring through him.

This does not, of course, mean he is not here.

Sherlock looks back to the fire, his skin prickling, a ball of nausea building up in the depths of his stomach. Oh God. Not Mrs Hudson. Not her.

But John is returning, he has spotted him, and his nausea grows, because John's mouth is set in too tight a line, his eyes glitter just a little too much in the crimson light, and the guilt burns in Sherlock like the fire around his old home.

John approaches him, and their eyes meet, and Sherlock suddenly cannot speak, cannot say a word, doesn't know _what_ to say, and he has never been lost for words before.

"They found her in bed," John says, and his voice has that gruff, croaky quality to it that people have when they are desperately trying to cover up their newfound grief. "It was the smoke, they say. She was asleep - she didn't know, she didn't - she didn't suffer."

Sherlock feels his bottom lip tremble; he breaks eye contact quickly, and for a moment both of them stare silently at the floor, struggle silently, a patch of quiet amidst utter chaos. Pain ripples between them, all the stronger for being unspoken.

"This is my fault," Sherlock says, finally, quietly, no louder than the roar of the engulfing flames close to them, but John hears it.

"What? How can it be - " and then his eyes widen, and he says, numbly, "Moriarty?"

Sherlock nods, still looking at the floor.

"John. I." He coughs, and clears his throat, then raises his head and says, steadily, "He visited me today."

John stares at him. "He did? Why?"

"He said…" Sherlock bites his lip, his insides are swarming with uncomfortable feelings, new feelings, and he hates it, he hates it. "He said that if I didn't leave him alone…there would be deaths."

John's stare intensifies, sudden fury swamping his pupils, and Sherlock welcomes the anger like a balm, because anger feels better than grief, so much better.

"You mean to say," John says coldly, such a contrast to the fire around them, "That he _warned _you, and you - what? You didn't believe him? Or did you just not care, Sherlock?"

Sherlock's silence is as good as a full confession.

"Jesus Christ," says John. "_Jesus Christ, _Sherlock!"

"I - I didn't - " starts Sherlock, but John has obviously opted in for anger rather than grief right now, and he is _furious._

"You _idiot! You bloody idiot, Sherlock!_ You let her _die _- and for what? A _game_? A fucking game with a fucking _psychopath_ - my _god - _"

"I didn't know it would be her!" Sherlock protests, his insides in turmoil. "I didn't - do you think I would have, if I had known he would - "

"_Yes!_" John shouts. "Yes, I bloody well think you _would _have!"

Sherlock blinks, taken aback, not sure what to say, not at all sure what he _thinks_ anymore, but John is beside himself, he cannot stop now.

"You _did_," he insists loudly. "You _did _know! He said it, I heard him, he said he would _burn the heart out of you _Sherlock, and he is, he is and - what? You're going to just let him keep doing this? Until everyone is _dead_, Sherlock?"

"No, of course not," snaps Sherlock.

"_Really?_" John snarls back.

Sherlock opens his mouth to answer back, but the words die on his lips. Because John is right, of course he is, Moriarty said he would burn the heart out of him, and then he mentioned deaths - of _course _they were going to be people Sherlock knew. People he cared for. Sherlock knew this. He knew this.

And he refused to let go. He would not leave it alone. He could not leave it alone. And now, even now, when the street is up in flames and a harmless wonderful old lady is dead for no reason, even now…he cannot even _imagine _letting it go.

_What the hell is he?_

His face must show his emotions, because John's expression softens a little and he takes in a little breath.

"Okay," he says quietly. "Let's - let's just…find a hotel or something, okay? There's nothing we can do here. Not now."

Sherlock nods, and lets John lead him away from the burning wreckage, and tries not to think that he can hear Moriarty laughing triumphantly in his ears, in his head, as he does so.

* * *

The scummy twin room they eventually find in a rather dubious area of town is not much, but it does have a kettle, and, once John has located a couple of mugs and a dusty box of PG Tips, he falls into that ever-comforting, ever-solid British custom - when in doubt, make tea.

He puts the kettle on to boil. Sherlock sits, silent, on the edge of his bed, his back up against the poisonous green wall, his coat wrapped tightly around him and face as pale as snow. He has said nothing since their fight at the house, and John can read nothing from his expression.

The kettle pings, and he pours out a cup and hands it to Sherlock, who takes it, gingerly, as if he is half convinced John is going to throw it in his face at any moment.

John is in the process of pouring his own cup when Sherlock speaks.

"I never told you the story about Mrs Hudson's husband, did I?" he says quietly.

John glances behind him. Sherlock is staring hard into the tea, and his fingers are twitching just a little on the sides of his cup.

He finishes pouring his own tea. "No," he says. "Not properly."

He clambers on the bed himself and seats himself beside Sherlock, both their backs to the wall, staring into the grimy little room.

Traffic rumbles past. The clock on the mantelpiece tells him that it is ten past two, but he can't imagine going to sleep - every time he closes his eyes, he sees flames gulping up Baker Street.

"Her husband," Sherlock says suddenly, "Wasn't a nice man. Got himself into a lot of drug dealing, a bit of dabbling with dubious people, a few killings, you know." He takes a tentative sip of his tea, and it obviously makes him feel a bit better, because he takes a larger drink. "But he was smart. He was clever. He covered his tracks so well, the Florida police could pin nothing on him. It wasn't long before he was literally getting away with murder."

He falls silent, suddenly silent, and John, because he doesn't know what else to do, prompts him. "Go on."

Sherlock sniffs. "Anyway, one time he wasn't so careful. Got arrested for murder, but he had friends in high places, and I mean high places, and it was obvious he was going to get out of it - and then I got this email." He takes another sip of tea. "I was still in the first year of being a consulting detective, so I didn't have many cases. But Mrs Hudson had heard of me, I'd helped a friend of hers with a case previously. And she said she needed my help."

He swallows, and continues, this time a little more tremulously. "I had nothing on and I was bored, so I went to Florida to see her. She - " and he takes a sudden breath, as if fighting something, and then says quickly, "I thought she was just a crazy old woman at first. I mean, god, she _chattered_ so."

John can't help himself, he lets out a small laugh, and those afternoons, those many long afternoons sitting with Mrs Hudson watching dreadful TV come swimming back to him, and suddenly he finds it hard to swallow his tea.

Sherlock is smiling, but painfully, as if his memories are both cheering and paining him. "She said she was sick of him," he says quietly. "She said she hated it, everything he was doing, that it wasn't right, that he treated people so badly, and that she didn't give a toss for the law, but she didn't like to see innocent people so dreadfully used, that it wasn't right. She said she knew where I could find evidence that would incriminate him, that would get him hanged, but that the way of getting it would be illegal, so she couldn't get the police involved. So she'd called me in."

Sherlock swallows. "She was tough," he says. "She was so tough. And clever. I mean, god, she didn't look it, she didn't sound it, but she was _clever._" He looks down into his tea, but apparently the idea of drinking it seems to have dissipated. John can sympathise; he is starting to feel ill.

"She was good," Sherlock says, voice hardly above a whisper. "She was so good."

John thinks about Mrs Hudson, about her ability to put up with Sherlock's idiosyncrasies, saying nothing when she found a stuffed leg in the coat-stand, merely tutting when Sherlock blew the door hinges off with his latest experiment, attacking them both with towels when they came in dripping from their latest encounter with the Thames. Sherlock is right. She was good.

He glances across at Sherlock. John and Mrs Hudson had bonded well over their crap TV encounters, but Sherlock was there before him, Sherlock got there first, and he was always, and would always have been, her boy. Sometimes John wondered if perhaps she saw the interesting things about her husband in Sherlock - his adventurousness, his lust for danger, his intelligence, if she was used to that sort of person being around. But no, it was more than that. Sherlock was the son she had never had, and she was the mother Sherlock had probably always needed. She had pampered him, and scolded him, and flattered him, and he, in return, had always been more gentile with her than anyone else John had seen him with. Sherlock had always been careful with Mrs Hudson, Sherlock was always gentlemanly to Mrs Hudson. Sherlock _liked _Mrs Hudson.

And he has killed her.

Sherlock stares down at his tea. "I'm just like him," he says flatly. "Just like him."

John doesn't have to ask who _him_ is. He clenches his fingers around his mug. "Stop saying that," he says as levelly as he can. "It's not true."

Sherlock stares at him, eyes narrowed. "Of _course_ it's true," he snarls. "Of course it's bloody true - I _killed _her - "

"No," retorts John, his pulse racing, still fighting to stay calm. "No, you didn't."

"I killed her because I wanted some fun!" Sherlock shouts. "You were right, okay, you were right! I can't let it go! I _need_ it, I need the danger and the excitement, I need it like a _bloody _drug, and I don't care who dies - for gods sake, John, I'm _just_ like him!"

John stands up, grabs Sherlock's mug and slams them both down on the table. Sherlock flinches back - a sure sign that his emotions are not entirely under his control at the moment - and stares.

John glares at him, breathing heavily, willing himself to remain calm because both of them can't be shouting at the same time. "What is he?" he asks through his teeth.

Sherlock frowns. "I don't - "

"He's a consulting _criminal_," John growls. "Okay? And what are you? Huh, Sherlock?"

"Uh - "

"You're a consulting _detective_," John answers for him heavily. He puts his hand to his head; his body is thrumming with stress. "God, Sherlock, don't you see?"

"No," Sherlock replies steadily. "I don't."

John lowers his hand. "Sherlock, you save people. You help them. That's what you do for your fun. But Moriarty - he _kills_ people for fun." He wants to pace but there is no room, to room to swing his arms, no room, so he stays still. "You could kill people, you could use them, you could do it as easily as Moriarty if you wanted - _but you don't._ You resist, even at your most bored, you _resist._ And so what if your only motivation for helping people is because you're bored? So what? You're still _helping_ them, and that is more than Moriarty has ever done, and ever _will _do. That's more than _most _people would do. Do you see?"

Sherlock's face is like marble, and now its not only his hands that are trembling, but his entire body, and he is almost curled up entirely on himself, his arms tight around his knees.

"I killed her," he says.

"You _didn't_," John insists. His heart is hammering again, but he has to get this through to Sherlock, he has to. "Moriarty killed her. Moriarty took hold of your weakness and he used it against you, and you can't fight it yet. That's not your fault. How is that your fault? It's an addiction, just like drugs, or alcohol, it's an addiction and he's using that. You're not _perfect_, Sherlock. And it wasn't your fault."

Sherlock's staring at him again, as if John is an angel, a heavenly messenger come to pronounce what is and isn't to him, and the responsibility comes in a heady mixture of fear and excitement; finally, _finally _John is making some sort of difference. He's being heard when he speaks.

"You have too much faith in me," Sherlock says eventually, hoarsely.

"And you don't have enough," John retorts.

It's as if he's just swung a hammer and broken straight through Sherlock's defences in one foul swoop. Sherlock's expression crumbles, a marble pillar falling to the ground, and he comes the closest that John has ever seen to letting go completely.

And then he takes in a breath, and another, and forces himself to build it all back up again, but John is already back on the bed and has an arm around his shoulders, a strong, warm arm, and it doesn't take much to carefully pull Sherlock closer to him. Sherlock rests one pale cheek on his shoulder, then takes in a long, low breath and relaxes completely against John's side, burying his face into the uncomfortable fabric of John's coat.

John attempts a comforting rub of Sherlock's shoulder. Sherlock sighs into his coat.

Silence reigns.

It is about half an hour later when John realises Sherlock's erratic breathing has levelled out, that he has relaxed utterly, and when John peeks under Sherlock's fallen locks, he sees that the great detective himself has fallen fast asleep on his shoulder, a faint frown line still furrowing his brow.

John rubs his shoulder again and watches the clock tick around to dawn.


	4. Recoveries and Discoveries

**Title:** Burn The Heart Out Of You - Part Four: Recoveries and Discoveries

**Author:** starjenni

**Disclaimer: **Not mine!

**Pairings:** Eventual Sherlock/John, and implied Sherlock/Moriarty if you read upside down and squint.

**Warnings: **Dark, dark happenings.

**Rating:** T

**Spoilers: SPOILERS FOR THE LAST EPISODE. DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED IT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED**.

**Summary:** Sherlock has not backed off. Moriarty follows through on his threat. How much of Sherlock must he destroy before Sherlock lets him go?

* * *

_The glass case is empty._

_It is empty, and it is all Sherlock can focus on, that it is empty, it is empty, and he does not know how, he does not know why. Never has he __**not **__know something of such importance. Never._

_Something has gone and he cannot get it back, because he does not know how it is gone, or why - and is this how others feel, all the time? Are they this slow all the time? How do they bear it? How can they __**bear **__it?_

_**He **__is there, laughing at the other side of the case, Sherlock can see him through the slide of glass, a triumphant smiling mouth, eyes like windows onto Hell. A face and a mind that he cannot unravel, someone that he cannot deduce, the block to his powers, the end to everything._

"_Back off," __**he **__says, but Sherlock isn't listening, cannot listen, he wants to know how __**he **__does this all, he wants to know, and - and is this how other people think about Sherlock? This insatiable curiosity, this desperate desire to know, to know __**how **__- does Sherlock appear as far apart from them as Moriarty does to him? Is he as much of an alien in their world?_

_Why is the glass case empty? How is it empty? _

"_Tell me," he is shouting, he can hear himself scream, but Moriarty just stands there, just smiles that cruel, twisted smile of the utterly insane, and Sherlock is banging on the glass, wanting to know, desperate to know, because not knowing is killing him, it is killing him - _

"_I will burn the heart out of you," says Moriarty…_

And Sherlock wakes up.

For a moment all he can see is white, and he is momentarily thrown…and then realises that he is lying face first into a pillow, and he groans and raises his head.

He recognises the scummy, tiny room instantly, now filled with late morning sunlight, and the sight of it brings all the memories of the previous night flooding back, and he has to close his eyes for a second. When he opens them, he looks around for John and sees him in the other bed, fast asleep. He looks old, Sherlock thinks suddenly, old and tired, there are large bags under his eyes and he has more frown lines than he did when he met Sherlock. Something in Sherlock's stomach twists unpleasantly, and he stands up quickly and quietly.

He needs to get out of the room.

* * *

Midday finds Sherlock sitting on the metal steps of the fire exit of the hotel, smoking his way steadily through the two packets of cigarettes he has just bought in a nearby corner shop. The nicotine patches can go to hell. This is an emergency. He is _angry._

The shuffle of footsteps behind him tell him that John has finally found him, but he keeps his eyes on the brickwork of the building next to them.

"I'm going to find him," Sherlock says aloud, barely able to keep the fury out of his voice. "I am going to find him, and I am going to bring his entire organisation down around his ears and then I am going to _kill _him. He thinks he can destroy me, well he has another think coming. I am going to _end him._"

He stubs his latest cigarette out on the railings of the steps and lights up another one - his mouth tastes horrible, but he is not in the mood to stop smoking, because if he does, he will have to find something else to do with his hands, and at the moment he is too much in the mood for a bit of strangulation.

The creak of the metal doorframe tells him that John is leaning against it. He's probably crossing his arms, Sherlock thinks, with an inward smile. He can predict John's movements effortlessly now.

"So the explosion of our flat wasn't enough of a hint then," John says. He is biting the words out - he is annoyed, of course he is, he doesn't understand. "You _still_ can't leave it alone."

"I'm not going to let her die for nothing," Sherlock says, remarkably calm considering every time he thinks of Mrs Hudson, his insides feel like they are ripping each other apart. She shouldn't have died like this, not like this, not her.

"Right, and you're not doing this because you love it at _all_ - "

"Not anymore." He is angry now, he is _so_ angry. "Now it's _personal. _How dare he. _How dare he._"

He takes a hard drag of his cigarette, watches the smoke float into the air, then looks up at John. John is staring down at him, with eyes of steel.

"He doesn't even need to try destroying you," he says flatly. "You're doing it to _yourself._"

They lock eyes for a long moment, and then Sherlock stands up. He is a couple of steps down from John, so John is still taller than him. It feels strange, and yet, in this situation, it also feels right. John has always been higher than him, really. So what if he is the genius, what does genius even mean? John is _better _than that.

"I've made a list," he says simply, "Of the people who I care about - and who might be in danger of him."

John nods, his mouth still formed in a disapproving twist. "Okay…"

"There's only two people," Sherlock says.

The corner of John's mouth twitches.

"Mycroft," Sherlock lists. It's the closest he's ever come to admitting that he actually _likes_ him brother, and yet John seems totally unruffled. He's obviously worked this out already. He has always been so good with people.

"How are you going to get hold of him?" John asks.

"He has a secure line," Sherlock says, puffing thoughtfully on his cigarette. "And knowing him, he's probably already on his way to somewhere safe. He would have worked it out as soon as Baker Street exploded."

John sniffs. "Nice of him to check if you were alive."

Sherlock flaps his hand. "No, no, he would have found out from someone else. He probably knows exactly where we are too."

Finally, _finally_, he gets a bit of grin. "Probably," John agrees. He shivers in the slight breeze that blows up - he has left his jumper in the room, and somehow this makes him look very small and breakable in the silvery winter light. A lump develops in Sherlock's throat for no reason, and he takes a quick drag to calm himself down.

"What about the second person?" John asks, and Sherlock stares at him, because surely he _knows_, but no, there is only inquiry in his eyes, no deception, he honestly hasn't _realised…_

"Well," Sherlock replies haltingly. "…That would be you."

John gives him a quick, wide-eyed look. "Oh," he says.

"Yes," says Sherlock. He clears his throat.

They stand in silence for a moment, and then both speak in unison,

"You should - "

"I'm not - "

They both stop, and watch each other hesitatingly.

"I'm not going anywhere," John says firmly, and _god_ doesn't he understand? Doesn't he realise yet how dangerous Moriarty is? He must do, he _must_ do, he must know the lengths to which Moriarty will go to destroy Sherlock. He has _seen_ the insanity in his eyes, he has seen the pure _hatred._

"He will find you," Sherlock points out, without even a tremble in his voice. "He will find you and he will kill you. Just like that. Not like before, where he used you as a hostage. He will just _kill_ you, John, and that will be it."

John holds his gaze, and Sherlock sees that he is completely unafraid. "I'm not leaving you," he says simply.

Sherlock flings his cigarette over the side of the fire escape. "_For Gods sake, John._"

John remains stupidly stubborn. "I'm not. You can't ask me to, Sherlock, not now, not if you're going to go through with this plan of catching Moriarty. You _can't._"

Sherlock sighs, but he cannot protest any further. To be fair, he _does_ need John, he can't do this alone, and even with the help of the entire London police force, he would still be alone…if it wasn't for John. And yet the idea of Moriarty watching, waiting for John to be alone before he strikes…it makes his skin crawl with a purely primitive fear and anger.

He is, for once in his life, honestly torn.

He stands in silence. Eventually John sighs. "All right," he says. "How about I stay for now and help…and if things…I don't know, get any worse…then I'll go. Okay?"

He doesn't like it, but then he doesn't like the sound of any of the solutions. There is nothing else he can say. He nods. "Okay."

John nods too, then smiles, pushes himself off the doorframe and walking up Sherlock, removing the packet of cigarettes out of his jacket pocket. "And in the meantime," he says wryly, throwing the packet over the railings without a second thought, "_Try _not to kill yourself with lung cancer. We don't want to make Moriarty's job any easier than it is."

Sherlock restrains the new, sudden and quite irrational urge to hug him. He smiles instead. "We need a new flat," he says. "Or at least a better hotel."

John nods. "Okay, well how about I sort that out while you get hold of Mycroft?"

Sherlock can only smile and agree.

* * *

Mycroft is a bit peeved that it takes Sherlock until the middle of the afternoon to ring him. He could have been murdered fifty times by now. Typical Holmes brotherly affection.

Still, he answers the phone smoothly and professionally. "Mycroft here."

"Where are you?" says Sherlock snappishly. His voice is rough, probably had four...no, five hours sleep…and not in a very comfortable bed either. Oh, and he's been smoking. Mummy _would _be angry.

Mycroft looks around his surroundings. "At the moment, I am on a rather second class aeroplane." It is still a private plane though, containing only he, a bored 'Anthea' (who has had her phone confiscated) and the pilot.

"Are you okay?" My, my. Sherlock really _must_ be feeling the worse for wear if he is coming out with such sentiment without hardly any prompting.

"Oh, yes. I have already swapped several planes. _Really_, Sherlock, did you expect me to hesitate for even a moment?"

"'Spose not," Sherlock mutters. Mycroft can only grin at this.

"You are standing firm then?"

"Yes," says Sherlock, and though he tries to cover it, Mycroft can hear the venom in his tone. Mycroft rarely misses anything. "I'm going to kill him. But first I'm going to destroy his organisation."

Mycroft purses his lips and glances out of the window. They are somewhere over the Alps, he can tell, although he is not meant to be able to know where they are going. No one is, except the pilot. When the British Government hides one of their own, they do it properly.

"You do realise," he says, "that if you bring him down, you effectively bring yourself down? Think of what he has done, Sherlock, think of the lack of crime without him. You are destroying your career in doing this."

Sherlock is silent for a long while. Then Mycroft hears, so quietly he can barely make it out, "I know."

Mycroft sighs. "There's no need to find a new hotel. I've arranged an apartment for you already, details should be at your desk."

"How thoughtful," Sherlock says dryly.

Mycroft rolls his eyes, he's had enough of his ungrateful baby brother for one day. For one _lifetime,_ he adds to himself. "Just be careful," he says, and hangs up.

He glances out of the window. The Alps have vanished and he did not see where they went. He looks up at Anthea as she comes out of the cockpit, and she gives him a grave nod; she has been working for Mycroft for a long time and is possibly just as expert as him at knowing when to trust someone and when not to. She trusts the pilot, and Mycroft trusts her.

He is safe.

* * *

John's phone goes off before he has even started looking for hotels.

_Meet me South Kensington. SH._

_

* * *

_

It's a penthouse apartment - a _smart_ one, very minimalist, light and bright, with huge glass windows that look over Hyde Park and the surrounding area. The apartment is _big_, two massive bedrooms with an en-suite each, a large kitchen-diner and a living area.

"_Holy shit_," says John when they enter. His eyes are about as wide as his open mouth. "Can we even _afford _this?"

Sherlock sniffs, looking around the kitchen. "Present from Mycroft. No doubt I'll be forced into some extremely _boring_ political case when this is all over." A note on the fridge reads: _no body parts, Sherlock_. He rips it off and chucks it over his shoulder.

John sits down numbly on one of the uncomfortable looking dining chairs. Sherlock's eyes set upon a large, blank expanse of wall.

"Right," he says decisively.

* * *

It's three weeks later, the wall is covered in pieces of paper, photographs and string, Sherlock hasn't slept for days, hasn't eaten for a week, and is running around all over the place, but he is _getting somewhere._

He paces in front of the wall liked a caged tiger, frowning at various comments he has scribbled down as if they have just insulted him. John sits at the table and devours a Pot Noodle - he too has barely stopped to eat and sleep since this began. The apartment is far more cluttered now with things they have bought, and although it feels a bit more familiar (Sherlock has even dug up a new skull - John hopes not literally), it is still not the cramped confines of 221b Baker Street with its bullet-holes and damp…in other words, it is not home. John feels like he is in a museum half the time; he doesn't know what Sherlock thinks, he doubts that Sherlock has even noticed the difference. Sherlock has been having a wonderful time, and hasn't even _bothered_ to try and hide it.

"We're getting there," says Sherlock. It seems to have become his mantra. "We're getting there."

"Did you learn anything more from the Carl Powers case?" asks John through a mouthful of noodles. He knows that this is their strongest lead, Sherlock has been calling in every favour he is owed about it.

Sherlock nods. "You were right, he was older. By about five years." He looks over his shoulder at John. "His name isn't Moriarty. He is James Morgan. The Moriarty was from his mother's line - Italians." He looks back at the wall, smoothing down a piece of paper as gently as if it is the hair on a newborn babe. "Both his parents died in a house fire," he says faintly. "He was just a kid; they put him into care and he went to school with Carl. I talked with a teacher about it, she said that Carl had bullied Moriarty, and accused him of setting the house on fire on purpose."

John stares blankly at him. "Do you think he did?"

"Don't know," Sherlock says vaguely.

John thinks about it. Perhaps Carl was right, he muses. Perhaps that was why Moriarty had killed him - to silence him. The thought adds a whole new chilling aspect to the previous case.

Sherlock is still staring at the wall, more specifically at a huge web of different coloured string covering half of it. "John," he says in a strange voice.

John, who has been flicking through a newspaper half-heartedly as well as eating his Pot Noodle says, "Mm?"

Sherlock turns and looks at him, and even under the bags and lines of strain on his now shockingly pale face, John can see he is agitated. "I've been going over every case I've ever solved," he states. "Thanks to the notes that I left with Mycroft, I've got most of them."

John nods. "And?"

Sherlock looks back to the wall. "And as far as I can see," he says, gesturing at the web of string, "Moriarty has had a hand in roughly eighty-five percent of them."

John stares. "_Eighty-five?_"

Sherlock nods, and goes over to the wall. "His organisation is like a web," he tells him, tracing the lines with one white finger. "Every contact a strand, every corner a crime. And Moriarty sits in the middle, like a great fat spider, twitching the web and making them _dance_." He places his splayed hand into the middle of the web and stares at it for a good long while. "John," he continues, at last. "If this is truly the case…then if I bring Moriarty down, I effectively bring down all the crime in London. And almost all of the UK."

John watches Sherlock, his noodles going cold. "You mean to say," he tries carefully, in case he has got it wrong, "That if you catch Moriarty then you're out of a _job?_"

One look at Sherlock's eyes tells him he has got it.

John sits back. "What's the alternative, though?" he says. "Let Moriarty keep going?"

"No one gets hurt if I leave him alone, remember," says Sherlock softly.

"But…" And then John gets it, _really_ gets it. He knows why Moriarty can't just be left alone.

Moriarty is the villain. The arch-nemesis. He can't be allowed to go free with his crimes. Not now that they know about him. It is not right, protests John's moral core, he must be caught. Not just because it amuses Sherlock, but because he has _hurt _people, he has _killed _them. He must pay the price, or the whole idea of justice will become just one enormous sham.

And who else but Sherlock could capture such a criminal?

_But at what sacrifice? _John wonders. _How many will die for this?_

"Do you think he knows we're investigating him?" John asks instead, because he has no answers for the unsettling questions he has just thought up.

"Oh, I'm sure of it." Sherlock stands back from the wall, running his eyes over it all. "In fact, I'm expecting another warning at any moment."

And then Sherlock's phone rings.


	5. The Sound Of Bells

**Title:** Burn The Heart Out Of You - Part Five: The Sound of Bells

**Author:** starjenni

**Disclaimer: **Not mine!

**Pairings:** Eventual Sherlock/John, and implied Sherlock/Moriarty if you read upside down and squint.

**Warnings: **Dark, dark happenings. SWEARING.

**Rating:** T

**Spoilers: SPOILERS FOR THE LAST EPISODE. DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED IT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED**.

**Summary:** Sherlock has not backed off. Moriarty follows through on his threat. How much of Sherlock must he destroy before Sherlock lets him go?

* * *

_AN: I hope you enjoy. This chapter and I had an EPIC BATTLE but I think I won. Eventually. Thank you for all the lovely reviews I have received so far, you all give me the motivation to keep going!_

_Last Chapter: "Do you think he knows we're investigating him?" John asks instead, because he has no answers for the unsettling questions he has just thought up._

_"Oh, I'm sure of it." Sherlock stands back from the wall, running his eyes over it all. "In fact, I'm expecting another warning at any moment."_

_And then Sherlock's phone rings._

_

* * *

_

The phone tells him that the caller is Lestrade. Sherlock answers at once.

"Is it Mycroft? Is he safe?"

"What?" says Lestrade's voice. "How would I know? That…Why are you - " He sighs; Sherlock can hardly hear him over the sudden pounding of his heart. "Look, we've got someone calling Scotland Yard, someone who says they want to speak to you."

Sherlock takes the pink phone out of his pocket, but it is silent. He frowns and looks up at John, who is waiting on the sidelines nervously.

"Be right there," he says and hangs up.

John can't help it. He sits next to Sherlock in the taxi and stares at him.

All this time he has been worrying about Sherlock, about what catching Moriarty would do to Sherlock, what it would cost him. If Sherlock had turned around to him yesterday and said that he was going to do what Moriarty wants and leave him alone, John would have been relieved, _so _relieved…

But now.

He has not considered other people. All those whom Moriarty has hurt or killed or used and abused. They must be answered. And what about those whom Moriarty will keep destroying, if he isn't stopped? He has to be stopped, of course he does. Even if it is at the price of Sherlock's entertainment.

Of course he does…

But then John looks at Sherlock and he thinks, _this is not right._ Sherlock is the only one who can do this, who can manage the great feat of bringing down Moriarty, and yet…at such a price. Baker Street and Mrs Hudson (home) has already gone, his brother is in danger, _John_ is in danger, Moriarty is plaguing him at every moment, with impossible cases, with ridiculous taunts, steadily burning away at his very core, like he promised to do, and his eventual defeat will also lead to Sherlock's overthrow. Sherlock shouldn't have _anything _to do with this, not really, others should be stopping this…and yet the task is impossible without him.

John wonders, for the first time ever, if the world is _using_ Sherlock. If _he _is using Sherlock.

Because if Sherlock turned around now, right now, and said that he should stop tracking Moriarty, John would dissuade him. It wouldn't be difficult, Sherlock is addicted after all, bound more tightly to Moriarty and to what he is than the strongest drug could achieve. And the deaths would stop.

But at the price of Sherlock.

How much does Sherlock matter? And to what, to whom? The end of almost all crime…is it worth Sherlock?

John has always thought he would answer a strong, firm _no_ to this. But he finds that now, when it is happening, _really_ happening, he has no answer to give himself.

He looks abruptly away, out of the window, and misses the quick flick of Sherlock's eyes to him, and then back.

Scotland Yard is buzzing, everyone is on edge, and as soon as Sherlock and John appear, half of them stand up. Lestrade is waiting impatiently by a large round table, a phone in his hand.

"He says he has a bomb rigged," Lestrade says, handing the phone to Sherlock. "Is he our bomber? From before? For god's sake, Sherlock, who is he and why does he want _you_?"

Sherlock gives Lestrade no answer. He puts the phone to his ear.

"I'm here," he says quietly.

"_Hi!_" says that voice, _that_ voice, of course it would be that voice. Sherlock's blood runs to ice. Lestrade motions to him to put it on hands-free and he does so, trying to ignore the way his hands are shaking.

He puts the phone on the table. Almost everybody crowds around it; Lestrade, Donovan, Anderson, nameless others, watching, listening, all with worried expressions. He can sense John's presence by his shoulder - warm, comforting; it is such a different feeling that he gets from the rest of them that for a moment his breath hitches in his throat.

"What do you want?" he says to the phone, to that hated creature inside it.

"I tried to find your brooooother," Moriarty sings carelessly. Sherlock's hands tighten on the table without him even realising it. "I failed though," Moriarty adds, as if it is some silly parlour game he has lost. "He really is _very_ clever, isn't he?"

Sherlock's mouth twitches, and he can't help a little pride from showing through. "Cleverer than you, anyway."

"Indeed." Moriarty's voice has gone from warm to cold, so cold. "And yet still I hear that you are tracking me down…and succeeding this time. Now, now Sherlock. We can't have _that_."

Sherlock's eyes harden. "I'm not going to stop."

"No, of course you're not," says Moriarty. "That would be _stupid_! After so much fun has already been had! To leave the party just as its starting up - no no no, that's not Sherlock _Holmes. _No." He sniffs. "Anyway, I'm sure no one would _want_ you to do it, you're being so _useful_ and all."

John's heart sinks. Sherlock twitches a little, like he doesn't when he doesn't _quite_ understand.

"What?" he says dangerously.

"You understand me perfectly," Moriarty responds, and his voice is a dark, soft, manipulative thing, and John has to quash the urge to pull the phone away, to hang up now. "No one wants you to _stop_, Sherlock, not _really._ Think of the crime that will be gone when I am caught. Think of what your investigating is _doing_ for all those poor millions of people. They all want you to catch me, Sherlock, and they don't give a damn what you lose in the process. Even your little pet, there. None of them _care._"

John closes his eyes in brief agony, and when he opens them, Sherlock is staring at him, his face inscrutable but very pale. He has deduced it, of course he has, he knows that what Moriarty is saying is the truth, but John cannot tell what he thinks of it - _does he understand? How can he? Does he?_ - and all he can do is hold Sherlock's gaze until Sherlock looks away.

"Why have you called me here?" Sherlock says to the phone, his voice as calm as if Moriarty has been talking about the weather. "Telling me this can't be the only reason." And then he pauses and adds quickly, snidely, as if he can't quite stop himself, "_James._"

There is a sudden silence on the other side of the line. And then, very quietly, Moriarty's disembodied voice says, "Don't. Call me that."

"Tell me what you want, James," Sherlock snaps.

"_Stop calling me that._"

"Sherlock," John interjects quickly, because Sherlock's eyes are flashing triumphantly, as if he has realised something, as if he is enjoying this peculiar but dangerous new torture; he looks like a child realising the power he has if he pulls the legs off an insect and John needs to stop this now, before it gets too out of control, before it gets too dangerous. _(Not that this isn't too dangerous already, not that this hasn't been too dangerous from the very beginning - )_

"Well, since I couldn't find your brother," Moriarty continues suddenly, light and bright once more, as if he has not previously dropped into darkness, "I thought I might try and target something else you love. _Like London._"

Lestrade flicks a quick glance at Sherlock; the rest of the group tense up.

"Which is why I thought the lovely Scotland Yard might want to listen in on this," Moriarty continues happily.

Donovan is glaring at Sherlock and saying "You _fucking -_ " but Lestrade cuts in on her, raising his voice so that Moriarty can hear him. "Tell us what you have done."

Moriarty's voice becomes all at once brisk and business-like. "I am in the process, right _now_, in fact" - and suddenly the sounds of traffic and people and the screams of London rushing by echo through the phone - "of setting up a bomb in one of London's many crowded streets, big enough to blow up a sizeable amount. If Sherlock Holmes doesn't _withdraw _his _nasty little feelers_ from my life within two hours, I will set it off. Do you understand?"

Everyone stands in silence, and Moriarty's voice breaks through before anyone can speak.

"Oh, this is brilliant. This is _fantastic._ Oh, you must all be so _indecisive._ Do you make your little bloodhound give up the chase or do you risk it? What's better, saving a few thousand people or catching Moriarty? The _fear._ The _panic._ Oh, it's Christmas!"

"Stop it," Sherlock retorts sharply.

"Two hours," Moriarty shoots back, suddenly cold, and the phone goes dead.

Everyone lets out the breath they haven't realised they have been holding. Sherlock bites his lip, his face very pale. The words _oh it's Christmas _revolve slowly around John's head, chiming far too closely to Sherlock's own expression of this when he had first met him. They are so alike, he thinks uneasily.

"This is ridiculous," Anderson finally snaps, breaking the silence. "Letting some madman blow up half of London so the freak here can get his kicks? I mean, what the _hell?_"

"Shut up," Lestrade fires back. He sighs, and takes a deep breath, leaning on the table and surveying Sherlock intensely. "Sherlock, just what are we dealing with here?"

Sherlock meets his eyes. He is no longer shaking, but the little colour he did have has drained out of him. "Moriarty," he says. "As far as I can see, he has had a hand in almost every major crime in London. He's…" He trails off, then leans across the table in an imitation of Lestrade, urgency pouring off him. "I'm so _close_," he says. "You have to believe me, I'm so close to finding him - "

"Sherlock - "

"You _have _to - "

"_No, _Sherlock, no! If he's targeting a main street, that's easily ten thousand people he's going to kill, I can't let you do this. In good conscience, I can't."

Sherlock's eyes darken. "You can't stop me," he says.

They hold gazes for a long moment, then Lestrade sighs again and leans back again. "No," he agrees. "I can't."

The people around him erupt. "You can't just let him - " shouts Donovan, but Lestrade rides above her.

"Just what the hell can I arrest him for? Trying to catch a criminal? Come on, Donovan, _think!_"

"He's a _psychopath_," Anderson shouts. "You know what he's like, he doesn't care how many thousands or millions or billions die - he'd do it himself if he _could_ - "

"This is ridiculous," says Donovan, joining in. "This is _stupid._ He's not just going to - "

They all fall into a riot of shouting and over-shouting. Sherlock stands silently, very still, staring down at the phone on the table, and John watches them all.

"Lestrade," he says finally, not very loudly, but his voice appears to stop the squabbling. All eyes turn on him, except Sherlock's, and he swallows. "Moriarty _is _very dangerous…"

"Oh right, of course, because of course you _would _wantme to keep going," Sherlock suddenly snarls. John glances up to find Sherlock glaring at him with utter venom.

"What?" he hears himself say faintly.

"_You_," Sherlock retorts coldly. "You, all of you, everyone here - " he waves a hand around the room " - you all just want me to keep going. He was right - I'm just your glorified bloodhound, aren't I? Because only Sherlock _Holmes _can catch him, only Sherlock _Holmes _is crazy enough to be able to!"

Everyone falls silent again. John opens his mouth but there is nothing there, there is nothing he can say, because he _has _thought it, hasn't he, and it is the worst betrayal but he has -

Sherlock turns his back on him, faces Lestrade. "Tell me you recorded the call."

"Of course," says Lestrade.

Sherlock nods. "Play the bit where he makes the threat. More loudly."

It takes a moment (a moment in which Sherlock steadfastly does not look at John) to find the right section, and then they play it.

"_If Sherlock Holmes doesn't - "_

"No," orders Sherlock. "Back further."

The tape is rewound.

"…_thought the lovely Scotland Yard…"_

"Yes, _yes,_" says Sherlock. "Turn it up and everyone be quiet."

The volume is wrenched up until Moriarty's voice is booming around the office. It is unnerving, as if Moriarty has somehow become a deity who can see through into their everything.

"_I am in the process, right now, in fact…" (the rush of traffic) "…of setting up - "_

"There! There!" exclaims Sherlock. "Did you hear it?"

He is greeted with blank looks and momentarily deflates. "I don't know how you manage through your daily lives without walking in front of buses and so forth, I really don't," he says resignedly, sounding so much like the old Sherlock that John feels his heart warm unexpectedly. "Play it again, and _listen_."

"_I am in the process, right now, in fact…" (the rush of traffic again) "…of setting - "_

"Yes!" Sherlock shouts. He whirls around to John, apparently forgetting everything else that has happened in his excitement. "Can you hear?" he asks.

John tries not to let his irritation show. "All I can hear," he says tightly. "Is Moriarty _threatening _you - "

"No," Sherlock interrupts. "_No._ Have you learnt nothing? Listen beyond that, listen behind the words. Play it again."

The tape plays. John listens hard. "I can hear traffic…" he says hesitantly.

"Yes, come on." Sherlock seems so enthusiastic that John listens extra hard. There are cars, people talking, footsteps, beeping, rustling, how can he possibly work out what -

He stops. And stares at Sherlock, eyes wide.

"Is that the sound of a bell?" he asks.

Sherlock's eyes light up, telling John he has got it.

"Not just any bell," he says. "The one o'clock bell of St Paul's Cathedral."

John stares at the clock over his shoulder. It is just gone ten past one. It is _possible._

"Are you sure?" he asks, but that's a stupid question, because of course Sherlock is sure - Sherlock knows every piece of London, every alley, every corner, every traffic light crossing, every paving slab. Of course he knows the sounds of the different bells.

"You think the bomb is _there?_" Lestrade asks, cottoning on.

"I don't think, I know. Play the tape again."

They do, and Sherlock nods.

"It's got to be somewhere on Ludgate Hill, by the sound of it," he says. "Near the rail station - Lestrade, you have to evacuate the area, all of it, for miles."

Lestrade hesitates. "Sherlock, if that's all you've got to go on - "

"I'm _certain_," Sherlock insists. "You have to!"

"Yeah, or you could agree to end this, Sherlock," Lestrade argues. "And then there wouldn't be any bomb to go off at all!"

The flame that has suddenly been lit inside Sherlock momentarily dims. He takes a deep, long breath. "You know I can't," he says quietly. "I don't want to, none of you want me to, Lestrade _please._"

They lock eyes once more, and Lestrade is the one who breaks the gaze first, sighing. "All right," he says. He raises his voice. "Okay everyone, we've got two hours to evacuate - "

"Oh, you have to be _kidding_," says Anderson, and Donovan chips in with "_ridiculous_" and yet Lestrade shouts, "_Two hours - now please_!" and they all either rush or shuffle off to obey, running to desks and phones, and Sherlock and John are suddenly left alone with an empty table.

A silence falls between them that is not quite comfortable, Sherlock's previous accusation hanging in the air. John wants to apologise, or something, to say that of course he doesn't mean it, of course Sherlock is wrong, of course Sherlock is more important than catching Moriarty…but he can't, because he _does _mean it. Sherlock is the most important person in his world, but some things transcend that. Justice, duty, what is _right_…he hates it, hates the fact that he feels this, that they are in this situation, but he cannot lie about it. Moriarty's murders need to be answered.

"Coffee?" he puts forward tentatively.

Sherlock, who has been staring blankly at the table, clears his throat and says, "Please."

He doesn't look at John, but John thinks that is probably too much to expect.

He goes and makes coffee.

Scotland Yard may be a bunch of 'bumbling indecisive morons' according to Sherlock in one of his many and insulting rants, but when action needs to be taken, it is taken. They evacuate before the two hours are up, then sit around the phone, waiting, waiting, waiting.

The two hours end. The phone does not ring, but after about five minutes, Lestrade's does instead.

He answers, and talks for a long while with the person on the other end, while everyone sits or stands in suspended animation, terrified.

Eventually he hangs up.

"Bomb went off on Ludgate Hill," he says, to collective sighs of relief. "No one was hurt, place was entirely evacuated. Well done, boys."

People laugh and smile and applaud, John lets out a great _whoosh _of breath, Sherlock closes his eyes, and for a moment, for a great shining moment, everything is fine.

And then Lestrade's phone rings again.

Everyone freezes. Sherlock's eyes fly open.

Lestrade hesitates, then answers it again. "Lestrade here. Yes, I - _what?_ _Shit _- how - that - all right, I'll be there as soon as possible. Yes."

He hangs up, and his fingers tremble on the buttons. Within five seconds he has gone utterly white.

"What is it?" Donovan croaks.

"Trafalgar Square," Lestrade says, in a voice with no emotion. "Bomb went off. They report - they report around seven thousand casualties."

A ball of nausea rolls unsettlingly around John's stomach, and he has to take a deep breath to force it back down. People moan and groan, and beside him, Sherlock has gone very, very still.

The phone on the table rings. Everyone stares at it. Sherlock is standing like an ivory statue, but the noise seems to wake him up, and he reaches forward and presses the hands free button.

"_Oops!_" Moriarty's voice crows around the room. "Did I forget to tell you about the other bomb? _Naughty _me!"

Sherlock says nothing.

"I knew you'd hear the bell, Sherlock," Moriarty tuts. "I'm not _stupid._ Did you really think you'd gotten away with it? Surely you know I'm better than that."

A muscle in Sherlock's cheek twitches, but he still doesn't speak.

"I hope you have fun cleaning up after me, Scotland Yard," Moriarty chirps. "You can blame Sherlock Holmes for this one. He should have left me alone, shouldn't you Sherlock? Seven thousand dead? But of course you don't care. Why should you? What are _they_ compared to _you?_"

Still Sherlock says nothing.

"Better go," Moriarty says, with a sigh, as if he really doesn't want to. "_Miss _you, Sherlock. Oh, and John Watson?"

John doesn't want to speak, not to this man, not to this monster, not to this murderer, but he manages to force out a grunt.

"See you sooooooon, John," Moriarty sings, and then hangs up.

John's stomach lurches; he looks at Sherlock, but Sherlock is clearly miles away, his eyes are as empty as if he is a standing corpse.

"I can't believe it," bursts out Donovan suddenly. "I can't believe it, seven thousand dead and _look!_ Look at him!" She points at the pale, motionless Sherlock. "He doesn't care! He just cares that he lost his silly stupid game! He's a _bloody _- "

"Donovan, _shut up,_" orders Lestrade, but Sherlock is already stepping away from the table, turning on his heel, and walking very slowly, very quietly, very tentatively out of the room, barely lifting a hand to push open the door. John hesitates, uncertain about whether he should follow him or give him some time _(and how much? How much time will sort this out?)_, but Lestrade says, suddenly, "John, we could really do with an extra doctor about."

John stops himself, and thinks instead about the people who will need his expertise, about those who are even more broken than Sherlock is now. He will be launching himself straight back into the war zone.

"Yeah," he says. "I mean, yes. Of course, of course I'll help."

Lestrade nods, and they fall into action, not the excited buzz of action that they had been in previously, but the action of those who have seen a disaster and now can do nothing but try to pick up the pieces.

Because doing anything else is unthinkable, and, perhaps this way, a few somethings may possibly be salvaged.


	6. A Smile

**Title:** Burn The Heart Out Of You - Part Six: A Smile

**Author:** starjenni

**Disclaimer: **Not mine!

**Pairings:** Eventual Sherlock/John, and implied Sherlock/Moriarty if you read upside down and squint.

**Warnings: **Dark, dark happenings. Also, _**FINALLY SLASH**_.

**Rating:** T

**Spoilers: SPOILERS FOR THE LAST EPISODE. DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED IT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED**.**Summary:** Sherlock has not backed off. Moriarty follows through on his threat. How much of Sherlock must he destroy before Sherlock lets him go?

_FURTHER WARNING: This chapter deals with a lot of death, explosions, ideas of terrorism and basically themes that could chime closely with the events of 9/11 (especially since it is close to the time when it happened at the moment). I have tried my hardest to treat the situation with respect and there is nothing _too_ graphic to worry about, but if you are in any doubts, DO NOT READ. (I should have put this on my previous chapter and I did not - for this, I apologise profusely, especially if anyone was badly affected.)_

_

* * *

_

_A/N: A lot of people had problems with the numbers of people killed off in the last chapter. I hope this chapter at least rectifies a few doubts. And if it doesn't…I protest artistic license! Which is a cop-out I know, but helpful for writers who cock-up :p_

_

* * *

_

John is fine.

John is fine right up until the moment when he isn't, and surprisingly that moment doesn't come when he has a young child bleed out under his hands, or when he has to pick half-dead victims out of the body parts of their loved ones, but when he is in the back of one of the hundreds of ambulances surrounding the area, for a moment alone, and he looks into the blacked out window to find himself staring back with wide, pale eyes.

There is a smear of blood on his cheek, and he can't remember whose blood it is, and for some reason this is what unravels him, as violently as pulling the loose string from a badly knitted scarf.

He sits down before he falls down and lapses into the breathing pattern that he learnt in his old PTSD therapy sessions. _In. Out._ Easy thing, breathing. Simple, not complex, not a mess, not like this is. This is more of a mess than he has ever anticipated, ever believed. This is too much of a mess. This is an _obliteration._

_

* * *

_

"_Seven thousand people," he says in the police car, as they make their way to Trafalgar Square. "That's impossible, even for an enormous bomb."_

_Lestrade, who has been on the phone for a longer time just before they left, is as white as snow. "Not one bomb," he says. "Several, but all linked to one another. At least, that's what intelligence is telling me. Linked into some sort of pattern, they said."_

_Trafalgar Square isn't a square when they arrive, but a crater, a war zone, a piece of the old Afghanistan days plunged into the new world that John has been living. He wonders briefly how he had thought he could ever get away from this sort of thing. It will always haunt him, of course it will, it will follow him - such death and tragedy and dust can never be escaped. It will follow him until he himself dies, and he will die with it on his mind._

_And then he finds those in the hundreds, in the thousands, begging for help, and his mind switches to doctor mode and he becomes the best doctor that he thinks he has ever been, and he is not John Watson, not for hours and hours, he is a doctor, he is a healer, and that is all that is important, that will ever be important. _

Do the job, John, just do the job at hand.

* * *

_He sees Lestrade again, leaving the scene to go back to Scotland Yard and delegate some more. It is five hours later when John sees him, the sun is setting but even with every ambulance here, every fireman, every helping hand that can be leant, there is still so much to do, so much pain that cannot be healed in time. There is more destruction than anyone knows what to do with._

"_Intelligence was right," Lestrade says without prompting when he sees him. Lestrade's face is still white, apart from very dark, very heavy bags under his eyes, and he looks ready to drop but also determined not to. He does not look well, he looks far, far from well. "They were linked, John, the bombs. Intelligence says that from the air the explosions are shaped into a big smiley face, Trafalgar Square being one eye, Covent Garden another, and the smile stretching all the way through Soho, from Russell Square to the edge of Hyde Park. Moriarty said the 'other' bomb, but he meant this, he meant these, he meant the shape. He should be being found, but its become a dead end. No one knows where to start, even the highest powers. John…only Sherlock can find him."_

_

* * *

_

A smiley face.

It makes John think of the smiley face that Sherlock painted on their wall and then shot holes in when he was bored.

It makes John wonder if Moriarty knows of this, if he has mockingly copied it, or if this is just another sign of the similarity between the two men.

He is sure it is the latter. Of course it is, because, down to the bone, they are too alike for this to be safe - of _course _Moriarty would arrange a series of explosions that would kill thousands into a _smile_. Sherlock would do the same, John knows he would, and this frightens him more than he would like to admit.

This is why only Sherlock can catch Moriarty. Because Moriarty is a genius, a psychopathic, unpredictable genius and the whole of the secret services could be onto him, but they wouldn't catch him, not like Sherlock could, because they cannot think the same way, and Sherlock can, he can, and it is awful to think it, but at the same time it is so very true.

John wonders if these signs, the same phrases (_"It's Christmas!")_, the same symbols, are indications from fate that only Sherlock can do this. Maybe the two are destined to do this, with London and its people as their play-toy, and no amount of struggling can change it, can stop it, because it is fate, it is inevitable. Maybe there is nothing _he _can do, except watch this wonderful, crazy new world of his collapse into smoke.

John does not like being out of control. He is trying to resist it. But he is falling anyway.

* * *

_They will never recover from this. No one will. This is a game that has killed thousands upon thousands, that has destroyed families, that has destroyed lives all over London, all over the UK. So many will know those who have been caught in this. So much _life_ wasted, so much _potential _lost forever. And for what? A silly game by two bored, arrogant geniuses._

_It is disgraceful. It is unthinkable._

_The unfairness of it pulses through him in place of energy, propels him on through every death he faces, every broken bone he sets, every shock blanket he gives, every distressed relative he talks to. He is angry, he is so angry, and he can do nothing. _

_London bleeds tonight and he could do nothing to stop it, but he must deal with the waste and the pain anyway, because this is what he does._

_It is becoming a pattern. Sherlock destroys, John attempts to salvage the salvageable. It is what they do. It is not fair, but it is what they do._

_

* * *

_

When his breathing calms down, when he regains a little of his previous peace inside the cold surroundings of the ambulance, John realises his phone is ringing, and when he glances at the screen, he sees that it is Lestrade.

He answers. His hands aren't shaking, because they never do when he is under stress, and he is under so much stress now it is unfathomable.

"John, we need you back here," Lestrade says without preamble. "Just for a while - we need you to get Sherlock out of here."

This is news to John. "Sherlock's still at Scotland Yard? Why?"

"I don't think he knows what to do," says Lestrade. "He's just sitting in one of the conference rooms by himself. But John - the word has got around that he could have stopped it, and if someone finds he's still here…I don't want to think about it. I don't need trouble, not here, not on top of everything else. If you could just take an hour. Please."

John looks at his blackened reflection in the window, at the blood on his cheek. He is needed here, by hundreds and hundreds, but then he has been needed for hours and he doesn't think that he can do much more before he honestly drops. And Sherlock needs him too, and, though it shouldn't be, that is important, that is so important. Asking him which is more important would be too unfair.

There is a lot of unfairness circulating tonight.

"All right," he says. "I'll do it."

* * *

John walks, because every piece of transport is either being diverted or entirely cut off or used to move those who have been caught up in the blasts and need to be taken to hospital or home, and its not too far to Scotland Yard from where he is anyway.

It's raining, which John hopes will help the firemen - although helping the wounded will be more difficult - and walking through it gives him time to think, to clear his mind as much as it can be cleared. The cries and moans and stifled sobs of the sufferers echo through his ears, and he has enough experience now from his time in Afghanistan to know that they will never go away, not entirely. It feels heavy on him, another brick added to the already full bag of pain saddled on his back.

The streets are empty, and it feels wrong, as though Moriarty has somehow effectively wiped everyone out of the world with his bombs, with his evil.

John's phone rings again as he walks, and this time it is Mycroft.

"I can't get hold of Sherlock," he says.

"I'm going to him now," says John.

"I've heard about what Moriarty said," says Mycroft.

John says nothing; he concentrates on walking.

"John," continues Mycroft. "You must know. You know he will come for you now. He's taken Sherlock's home and now he's taken London - you are all that he has left now, and Moriarty will take it."

John purses his lips and closes his eyes, even as he walks. The rain splatters the top of his head, his hand and his phone. It is so cool compared to the fire and destruction he has been wading through since this began.

"I'm not going anywhere," he says.

"Yes," says Mycroft. "You are. Call me when you need me - this number is secure and I can help you."

He hangs up. John opens his eyes into the rain and thinks _I'm not going anywhere_.

* * *

Sherlock is in a high, large, empty and dark conference room in Scotland Yard when the pink phone rings.

He is sitting in a chair that faces a large glass window, and from it he can see the burning craters in London. He is not stupid. He can work out their pattern.

He answers the phone.

"_Hi!_" chirrups Moriarty. "What do you think of my art?"

He sounds jubilant, and Sherlock can recognise the emotion inside the voice, because Moriarty sounds exactly like Sherlock when he has solved a particularly difficult case.

He looks out on the scarred London. "Very nice," he says dully.

"Let me tell you something about fire," Moriarty says.

"I'd rather you didn't," Sherlock shoots back, but Moriarty ignores him, as he knew he would.

"Fire cleanses," says Moriarty. "Fire is misunderstood. People don't _think _about it - not like I do. They think it just kills, but I know - I know - fire destroys and burns, but it also cleanses. It wipes everything clean. When I need something cleansed, I use fire. It isn't messy, it does its job, and there's nothing left after it has been used. Water is full of complications, leftovers. Fire kills everything and erases everything. And then things can be started again on the ashes left behind."

"Is that what you did with your parents?" Sherlock asks sourly. "_Erase _them?"

There is a cold pause. "Carl Powers died for saying that, you know," Moriarty says finally.

"Yes," says Sherlock. "I know. He got too close, didn't he? Got too close to what you _really _were, James. So you got rid of him." _Drowned though, not burned. Why? Because you wanted the leftovers. You wanted to show yourself what you were, leave yourself a reminder. If you had burned him, you might have forgotten._

"I don't like it when you call me James," Moriarty whispers.

"Why? Are you going to get rid of me too if I say it, James?" Sherlock snarls. "Going to burn me like you drowned Carl? Well you're already doing it, aren't you? And bringing everyone down with me."

"Seven thousand," Moriarty says, proudly. And he should be, Sherlock thinks vaguely. Managing that number without anyone noticing? Superb. Brilliant.

If John was here, Sherlock knows he would say _awful._

"You know," Moriarty says brightly, "That could have been seven thousand criminals I destroyed. Practically a civil _duty_, really. They should give me a medal."

"Or it could have been seven thousand John Watsons," says Sherlock.

He shouldn't have said it. He didn't mean to.

Moriarty laughs delightedly. "It's brilliant, you know," he says. "Brilliant and _pathetic_ how well he's got to you. What do you see in him, Sherlock? What could you possibly see in _that?_ He's normal. He's _boring._"

"Stop it."

"The great Sherlock Holmes, not brought down by anyone wonderful, but by someone _ordinary._ Fascinating."

"_I said stop it._"

"You know he's next, don't you? I'm going to burn him, Sherlock Holmes. I'm going to erase him, just like all the others, and his death will be the death of you and it will be _wonderful._ It will all burn _wonderfully. _Can you _feel it - _"

Sherlock's finger cuts off the connection before his brain can catch up with him. His heart is pounding again, and the phone is clutched tight to his ear, and in front of him the world he loves burns and falls into ash, and his mind is whirling, and it is awful, it is magnificent, it is awful.

* * *

John is soaked when he gets into Scotland Yard, but he doesn't stop, he searches the building until he finds the room Sherlock is in.

It is pitch black, lights off, and Sherlock is standing by a huge glass window, silhouetted by the rage of flames outside, and in his hand the hated pink phone rests, and even from here John can see he is shaking.

John says nothing, and makes no noise to say it is him; Sherlock knows he is there already. He merely walks forward until he is standing beside Sherlock, and they stare out at the wreckage together. From this height, John can see that Lestrade was right - the craters are in the shape of a smile, and seeing it for himself just adds another chill to the collection already creeping up and down his spine.

He looks over at Sherlock, at his pale, aquiline face glowing yellow and orange with the flames. London is Sherlock's, London belongs to him as much as he to it, it is his life, his heart, it pumps his blood just as it pumps traffic through its streets. Scarring London scars Sherlock. It as if Moriarty, by bombing London, has effectively scraped his own fingernails down Sherlock's body, breaking the skin, letting the blood pour forth. This is as personal as Mrs Hudson and Baker Street. He might as well have stabbed Sherlock himself. It would have hurt less.

John looks down at Sherlock's always pale, always elegant hand. It is less than a finger's breadth away from his own, and it is trembling, and he reaches forward and takes it in his own grasp before he is even thinking about it.

Sherlock's fingers are cold, and they curl around John's and hold on tightly, as if he is afraid that he will be ripped unceremoniously from John at any moment.

"My fault," Sherlock says in a low rattle.

John squeezes his fingers. "_Not _your fault," he whispers. He doesn't need to add any more, he doesn't need to say _you didn't set up the bomb, you didn't even know about the bomb, it wasn't your finger that set it off, it was him, it was him, and I should have said it before but I want you to catch him, I do, because people have died, so many have died now, and I need his capture as much as you do._

Sherlock turns his head, so that his eyes meet John's, reflecting the fire outside so that there are amber and gold flames blazing inside his pupils. John thinks about what this explosion has done and will do - because people will be talking about this forever, and every time they do, Sherlock will remember his part in it, he will remember what he could have done, he will remember this moment right now. He will remember and remember and remember and it will never go away. Moriarty has created a pain that will last.

"I need to stop him," Sherlock says, and John is already nodding halfway through the sentence and he natters, "I know, I know Sherlock, I'm not going to - I know."

And then the phrase comes into mind as loud as an explosion, with as much disorder and chaos along with it.

_I love you._

And that is why. That is why he does everything, anything, connected with Sherlock.

He stares at Sherlock, as still as if someone has just shouted it into the room, and for a moment even the fires blazing outside freeze, for a moment he forgets all he has seen tonight, all the pain and the grief, and it is just Sherlock and that phrase in his head. The words cure everything, and they shouldn't because there is so much to be cured, so maybe it is just for a moment, maybe the screaming terror of the world will come back once he has stopped thinking and feeling this…but then maybe it won't.

_I love you._

And then, horrified, _why now?_

Sherlock helped cause this. Oh, John can argue that it was Moriarty, that Moriarty did this, but the fact is inescapable that Sherlock could have stopped at any time, and that he did not, and now _look where they are_, people are dead, and John hates people who kill innocents, but he does not hate this one. He could never, even if Sherlock killed _him_, personally, in his last moments he would still love him, he would still look up at him and love him.

That is not right, but it is perfect.

Sherlock's eyes are as dark as coal.

"What's it like?" he asks.

"Like Hell," John says, and he does not know whether he means what he has seen tonight or what he feels now.

Sherlock frowns. "I meant, being wrong," he says. "About me."

_Of course, _John thinks. _Thousands die and all you think about is yourself. Of course. Of course._

"I'm not wrong."

"You said I save people. You said, _Sherlock, you save people. You help them. _You were wrong."

"No, I wasn't."

"Really. I just killed seven thousand."

"And saved me."

Sherlock stops. And stares. And in the silence, only the fires outside move.

"Isn't it ridiculous," John says, _babbles _really, but he doesn't like to think of it like that. "I've just spent hours on hours cleaning up the mess you and Moriarty have created, trying to pick up the pieces of something that can't be healed, that can never be healed, and when I walked back I could feel it all falling down on me, I could feel myself being dragged down with it all, and then I see _you_, and even though you did this, you helped this, seeing you made it all better. Just for now, Sherlock, just for now - it is all better."

Sherlock stares at him, a pattern of light and darkness, completely motionless, his hand perfectly still in John's, and John wonders if he has gone too far, if he has stepped over some invisible line, if he has not thought like Sherlock does, if he has missed something.

"Aren't I stu - " he starts to say, but Sherlock stops him before he can finish, by swiftly leaning down and kissing him, kissing him while the world outside turns and burns, cold lips on wet, with fire all around, and it is crazy, a betrayal of everything that John stands for, kissing the man who has done such damage, but for once, for once, he will be selfish and it will be wonderful.

One of them turns his head, another opens his mouth, tongues dance with tongues, and it feels like drowning, so he leans forward to cling to Sherlock, but Sherlock is already clinging to him, and they fall together whilst standing very, very still, and it is right that they should do this, together, because otherwise none of this counts for anything.

When Sherlock moves back, his lips are as damp as John's, and his hair is untidy where John has run a hand through it, and there is blood on his face, where he has rubbed against John's own bloodstained cheek, and John thinks that is proper, that Sherlock should have something to show what he has done, because standing so perfect, so untouched, like this, when thousands are dead, is wrong.

The fires outside are still burning. John can't take his eyes off the smudged blood on Sherlock's cheek.

"You have to go," Sherlock says. "You heard what he said. He said he would see you soon. It's time for you to go."

There is nothing else he can say. "No."

Sherlock's perfect, destroyed face takes on lines of urgency. "You promised," he says desperately. "You said if things got any worse then you would go. Well, they have. John, you _promised._"

"How can I leave - ?"

"John, he's taken everything else! I need to stop him, and I can't do that if you're in danger, if I think that you're not safe, for any moment, I can't do it. Do you see? I need you to go."

John stares up at him. "To stop him," he says.

Sherlock nods earnestly. "To stop him," he echoes.

It is not right, that they should sacrifice this when they have already sacrificed so much, not when it is just beginning. But maybe this is what it will always be, a long series of sacrifices with stolen, snatched moments in between. Maybe this is all it can ever be.

And briefly John hates it. Hates this addiction of Sherlock's. If he wasn't so obsessed with his mind, if Moriarty was gone, then…well, then anything could happen. Would happen.

And he isn't sure, is not entirely sure, that Sherlock really _will _catch Moriarty. Not without letting him go afterwards. He needs the chase, and the case, and the _electricity _of it all, and John is not enough, will never be enough, while Moriarty is around.

If only there is something he can _do._

He has to trust. That is all he can do. Trust that Sherlock will do the right thing.

"All right," he says, hating the words. "All right."

Sherlock takes a deep breath and nods, and he steps a bit back, and the spell starts to break.

"Your brother called me earlier," John says, to fill the silence, to fill the horror of what he is feeling. "He offered to help. I. Uh. I'll ring him and go pack."

Sherlock nods again; apparently, he can do nothing else. "I need to talk to Lestrade. About what you're - about what we have - about what I'm going to do."

"All right."

"All right."

The fires are still burning outside, and the pain and the anguish that John has gone through, now and before, is coming back to him, like he knew it would, but he still finds a last vestige of strength to lean forward and squeeze Sherlock's hand.

"It's all right," he says, as softly as he can, and then he leaves, he leaves Sherlock and the bleeding London behind, and he gets ready to vanish, because he has to, and because he can do nothing else.

It is the worst thing he has ever had to do.


	7. Mirrors

**Title:** Burn The Heart Out Of You - Part Seven: Mirrors

**Author:** starjenni

**Disclaimer: **Not mine!

**Pairings:** Eventual Sherlock/John, and implied Sherlock/Moriarty if you read upside down and squint.

**Warnings: **Dark, dark happenings. For this chapter: BOY KISSING, DEATH, UTTER MISERY. Also swearing.

**Rating:** T

**Spoilers: SPOILERS FOR THE LAST EPISODE. DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED IT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED**.

**Summary:** Sherlock has not backed off. Moriarty follows through on his threat. How much of Sherlock must he destroy before Sherlock lets him go?

* * *

_AN: Apologies for my absence, I absolutely suck, as does my real life. One of these days, I am going to lock myself up for years and years and just write. Anyway. I have now returned to break your hearts once again! This should break it well and truly, if I am doing my job right :p. If I am, do tell me! Reviews are golden and taste of love._

_

* * *

_

Sherlock gets back to their penthouse as quickly as he can, but the traffic and the hasty diversions that have been set up means that he has to walk, and he does so whilst taking all the back routes and little alleyways he can think of, because going anywhere near the wreckage, seeing anything to do with the disaster that he has caused, that he has helped make…it is unthinkable.

Sherlock knows he is being cowardly in this. It is the first time he has ever thought himself a coward, and now that the thought has entered his head, it won't leave - has he been a coward all along? Has he been a coward with everything that has happened, with everything that Moriarty has done? Has he been a coward because he couldn't back down, because he had to keep going with the mystery and the intrigue and the excitement? Has he been a coward because he couldn't sacrifice a chance to be clever for all of the world?

Maybe it takes courage to make such a sacrifice. Courage Sherlock does not have.

He is clever, he is _so _clever…but he is not brave.

* * *

He arrives in the penthouse in a rush, because John might already be gone, but the lights are still on so it is unlikely - and then, just as he enters the living room, John comes out of his bedroom, suitcase in hand, and they both see each other and freeze, two wax models trapped in a room of metal and glass.

John is the first one to move; he takes two steps forward into the centre of the room and then puts down his suitcase. Sherlock copies his movements, until they are but a footstep away from each other.

They stare at each other.

John is also the first to speak. "Mycroft said a car would be here in five minutes. He's. Uh." He coughs and looks down. "He said he's putting me on a plane to somewhere. I won't know where. And I won't be able to contact you."

Sherlock nods, because he has already realised this, he has already thought this, and he doesn't like the sudden gap it created inside him. "I know."

John looks at him like he wants to say a thousand things but doesn't know how to, or where to start, and Sherlock can identify with that because he is currently having exactly the same problem. There is so much to say, so much to confess, so much truth that the air is thick with it.

Finally, John says, "Don't. _Don't_ let him drag you down with him. Don't let him think that you aren't _you._ Uh. If that makes sense."

Sherlock forces a smile. "It makes sense." And then he swallows and thinks he should say it, if he can't say anything else he has to say this. "I'm sorry, John."

He has never apologised in his life. The words feel foreign and strange on his tongue, but it is almost worth it for John's reaction alone, which is a picture of absolute astonishment.

"You - what?" John splutters.

For a second Sherlock wants to laugh at John's face, because it is _fantastic_, and that feels odd, because he has quite forgotten to laugh until now, and the realisation sends another wave of fondness sweeping over him, fondness for this ordinary, simple, small man in knitted jumpers. Fondness for _John_ - just John, always John.

"I'm sorry," he repeats. "For letting all this happen. For letting - all the people, Mrs Hudson, _you_ - "

"Sherlock," John interrupts. "It's fine. Just like I said before, remember? It's all fine."

Sherlock looks despairingly at John, at those compassionate blue eyes. "You can't honestly mean everything."

That determined look, a stubborn look, _the soldier's look _Sherlock has privately coined it in his head, flickers onto John's face, and he crosses that step, walks forward and curls a hand around Sherlock's head, tangling his fingers into his hair and pulling him down closer. "Sherlock," he says. "_Everything._" And he kisses him.

John kisses sweetly and warmly, and he tastes of tea and thick jumpers and _home_, and Sherlock willingly falls into that silent patch of safety and security he creates around them, welcoming it to him like an old, old friend. The kiss is chaste and shy and more than a little bit sad, and when John pulls slightly away it is all Sherlock can do not to throw his arms around John and hold onto him as tightly as possible and not let go for anything, anything, anything.

Instead he says, "Why?" and watches as his word flutters the edges of John's hair.

He's not sure if John is smiling, because their faces are so close to each other, but John's voice sounds like honey when he speaks, so he suspects he is. "Because you're brilliant," he says. "And an idiot."

Sherlock lets out a huff of laughter at this, and then abruptly his merriness turns into a deep and unfathomable sadness, and he gently slides his forehead against John's and then rests against it, closing his eyes. John is his friend, his only real friend, and he is more important than Sherlock can ever say, even if he had years to think it over. He is…_everything_, yes, why not? Everything.

"Don't let him take you," John murmurs, warm breath ghosting over Sherlock's face. Sherlock opens one eye to see that John also has his eyes closed, his hands still in Sherlock's hair.

He closes his eye again. "I won't."

It's John that moves; Sherlock knows he won't move, because he feels like he has been carved out of ice, but John doesn't move away, no, he moves _closer_, unpredictably, and kisses Sherlock again, and this time it is a kiss of _intent._

It's funny, but Sherlock has never really imagined what it would be like to kiss John. That's the sort of thing a sickeningly loved up girl would do, not the world's only consulting detective. But if he had ever imagined it, he would have got it wrong. This is not imaginable, this sensation, this feeling, even if Sherlock had the best imagination in the world, he could not picture this, not perfectly, he could not recall the _heat_, (_John's tongue on his) _the _pressure _(_lips on lips, teeth on lips_) and the _hungerhungerhunger_. He wants to devour this, all of this, he wants to burn into this until there is _nothing _left, he wants to go so deep that he can't find a way out, he wants to eat this feeling up, chew, swallow, _rip _this feeling up -

There is a sudden buzzing sound, from apparently miles away, but it is enough to make Sherlock jerk slightly away and grab a breath of air, because he hasn't been breathing for what feels like forever, and although breathing is _boring_, especially compared to _this_, it is necessary.

John is clinging to Sherlock's shoulders, nails digging into his shirt, breathing hard, and his eyes are blown, black as anything, and his mouth is wet and pink, and he stares at Sherlock as if Sherlock is a god, and that is terrifying.

"_Fuck_," John says eloquently.

It's probably the only word that can just describe _that_, _that_ and the feeling that went along with it, the sort of feeling that makes Sherlock want to drag John to the floor and do bad, bad, wonderful things.

He can't find any words to say, so he leans forward again, intent on getting back that fury and fire and addiction, but as he is about to, the buzzing sound rings again, and he realises that it is the flat door.

John glances behind him at it. "That's probably the car," he says, and then. And then.

And then it all comes back to Sherlock, the memory of everything that has happened and will happen now, the feeling of _separation_, that hollow feeling that the hunger and heat chased away, and he can't help but let out a gasp of air.

John gives him a long, measured look, but steps back and picks up his suitcase anyway. Sherlock would think he was fine, except that the hand holding the case is trembling violently. "Got to go," he says.

Sherlock nods. He thinks _I may never see you again_. And then thinks, if I don't there will be no more of that hunger, no more of that security, no more of John with his morals and his jumpers and his propensity to get angry over body parts in the fridge, there will be no more John ever again, there will only be silence.

"Be careful," is all he can make himself say, and John is nodding and says, "You too. You too."

They stare at each other. Sherlock thanks whatever deity is closest that they cannot see the flames and fire of the bombs from their apartment, because that would ruin things, ruin this calm, and this small bubble of forgetting that they have made. They stare and stare and stare at each other.

The buzzer goes again. John blinks and steps back. "Right," he says, and this time he actually walks towards the door. Sherlock lets him go, because he has to, and thinks that John looks small, lost almost, tiny, and then John is through the door and he thinks nothing.

He is alone.

* * *

John's phone goes off as he walks towards the car, and he looks at it, pretending his hand isn't shaking as much as it is.

It is Sarah, frantic and questioning. He thinks, suddenly, that he should explain to her somehow; he has not thought about anyone else but Sherlock in this mess, not really, but people must be wondering, people must be worrying. He can't just vanish without saying anything…

If he sees Sarah, it will be closure. On his life before and his life now. He thinks that he needs it.

It does not have to take long.

He gets in the car and says to the nondescript driver, "There's somewhere we need to go first."

* * *

Lestrade rings Sherlock two hours later, and Sherlock knows it is bad, because Lestrade's voice is shaking, and Lestrade's voice _never _shakes. Seven thousand people dead, and he was not so tremulous.

"Sherlock," he says, all quiver, all terse, "You need to come to Scotland Yard."

Sherlock very almost runs all the way there.

When he sweeps in, all darkness and worry, Lestrade is there, his hand around a phone, and everyone looks at him with pity and fear, even Donovan, and his heart sinks.

He looks at Lestrade and says, "Tell me no."

Lestrade replaces the phone onto the receiver, his face white. "A building exploded, about ten minutes ago. The house of a woman called Sarah Sawyer."

And Sherlock thinks, _he can't have been such an idiot. He can't. He _can't.

"They found two bodies, Sherlock," says Lestrade. "A woman. And a. Uh. And a man."

Nausea rolls inside Sherlock, rolling up, from his toes to his head, and he does everything he can not to stagger.

"Sherlock," says Lestrade. "The man fitted John's description."

The nausea rises in Sherlock, a towering wave, and overwhelms him, and he turns on his heel, runs through the door, finds the toilets, falls to his knees and vomits, again and again and again. The world spins and he clutches the cold porcelain and continues to retch, even when there is nothing left but dry air inside him, he retches and chokes and gasps, and his head whirls, and after a while, everything goes painfully black.

When the world comes back, it does so gradually, in a series of sensations. Sherlock feels cold tiles grating against his knees, and a similar cold smoothness under his fingers, and although his breath his coming out in harsh, short grunts, there is nothing else besides, it is silent, it is all silent.

He collapses away from the toilet, sliding against the cubicle wall instead, and he puts his head on his knees and his arms under his legs and for a moment he closes his eyes and doesn't think about anything.

But the world is about as insistent as his mind, and after a while, new feelings and thoughts come sneaking in, the tap outside _not quite turned off properly drip drip drip the sound of someone in a hurry, _the tiles under Sherlock's hands _fourteen he can feel, one, two, three, fourteen, the grouting is bad between them, the workman was in a hurry as well, one of the tiles is just a little wonky, the twelfth, just a little - _

He says loudly, "_John_," and the voices in his head stop. The word echoes a little around the bathroom, a broken, stuttered syllable. Sherlock raises his head and stares up the cubicle wall at the white, blank ceiling, and for the first time in his life he feels very, very small. He wonders if this is how John feels _all the time_ and then thinks, _I will never be able to ask him now._ It seems like a grievous thing not to have asked, not have wanted to know.

His phone goes off with a text, the pink one, and he feels weak, he doesn't want to answer it, this is the only time when Moriarty has made himself known and Sherlock has thought _no, nonono, I don't want to know. I don't want to know._

He reads the text anyway, sliding the phone from his pocket to the badly tiled floor and presses the button.

The text reads: _BYE BYE JOHN WATSON._

He switches the phone off and stares at the cubicle wall.

I have killed John Watson, he thinks, blankly.

He feels cold.

* * *

It could be hours later, or minutes, but eventually Sherlock levers himself off the floor and manages to make it to the sink. He washes his face and hands in the coldest water the tap can produce, and then, almost reluctantly, looks at his expression in the mirror. The light is not bright enough and everything looks grey, except his face, which is white and cold like marble. He cannot quite look himself in the eyes. He thinks he looks like a god, immortal, or like a demon, and he wonders if John was the thing, the only thing, that could make him human, and now that he has gone, it has too.

Maybe he is immortal. Everyone, anyone of any importance, has died but he is still alive. He is immortal. And like all immortals, he will forget. Will he forget John? He likes to think that no, he never will, _nevernevernever,_ but something darker and deeper and more difficult whispers, _yes_, and he knows he shouldn't, but he listens to it, like he always has. It has never done him any good, but he listens to it.

His reflection in the mirror looks momentarily anguished. He wants to smooth it out.

So he thinks instead about mirrors. He thinks about how they can reflect what is there, and then he thinks about how they can reflect what _isn't _there.

_What isn't there_, he thinks, and realisation, cold and hard and _wonderful_ hits him.

He touches the mirror with one long, delicate finger, and his image returns the favour. "Mirrors," he says.

_Mirrors,_ echoes Sherlock's reflection, soundlessly.

He huffs out a laugh, painful and astonished, and he thinks _of course_.

"Mirrors," he repeats again, the bathroom tiles echoing it dully back to him. _Mirrors, mirrors, mirrors._

"_Mirrors_, John," Sherlock says, and for a moment he can hear it and feel it, he can actually hear John's completely bemused …_what?_ and he can feel that warmth, simple and complex, at his shoulder and he knows that if he looks, he might see just a glimpse of John by his side, a scrap of that grey jumper, or a flash of dark blonde hair. He does not look to the side, because he knows John won't be there, it is only his imagination and he won't pander to it, because that way lies madness, and after a moment, the warmth fades and there is only coldness. He wonders how long the cold at his shoulder will last before he forgets it completely.

He thinks, _John._

He thinks, _mirrors._

Maybe it was John's death that made him realise this, he thinks, that made him solve the unsolvable case. The shock made his brain work, it didn't dull it, it made it _work_, and now he knows how Moriarty did it, he knows, he knows, he _knows._

John needed to die for the case to be solved. He wonders now if that sacrifice was too large. He has no answer for himself.

He retrieves the pink phone and types out a quick text.

_Mirrors. The pool. Midnight._

He thinks that it might as well end where it began. Because it will end there. Everything else has ended, only Sherlock is left. He must end it now. It's got to end.

He sends the text, and does not think about the empty space at his shoulder, and it remains there.


	8. Game Over

**Title:** Burn The Heart Out Of You - Part Eight: Game Over.

**Author:** starjenni

**Disclaimer: **Not mine!

**Pairings:** Eventual Sherlock/John, and implied Sherlock/Moriarty if you read upside down and squint.

**Warnings: **Dark, dark happenings.

**Rating:** T

**Spoilers: SPOILERS FOR THE LAST EPISODE. DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED IT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.**

**Summary:** Sherlock has not backed off. Moriarty follows through on his threat. How much of Sherlock must he destroy before Sherlock lets him go?

* * *

_A/N: THIS IS THE FINAL CHAPTER GUYS. Thank you to everyone who has reviewed and encouraged me, it means more than I can say. And I hope this ending is good and that you like it, and thank you, THANK YOU, for everything. I love you all. xxx_

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It is colder in the pool this time, but that is the only difference Sherlock can find in the situation then and the situation now. Except that he knows this time John won't suddenly appear, a hostage where he should not be a hostage, because John won't be appearing anywhere ever again.

It is so cold that he can see his breath mist before him when he breathes out.

Moriarty does not make a grand entrance this time; he is already waiting at the other side of the pool when Sherlock enters. He has the same suit on - symmetry, of course, he likes it as much as Sherlock - and his hands are in his pockets, and he is smiling at Sherlock like he is a long lost lover.

"_Darling!_" he crows when Sherlock enters, and when he has walked up to the edge of the pool and stopped. "_Hi!_"

Sherlock watches his breath two, three times. He says, "Mirrors. That's how you did it. The Rosetta Stone. You used _mirrors._"

Moriarty's smile gets somehow wider; he looks like a shark, smiling before devouring. "Ooooh, well _done_, Sherlock," he says. "_Very _clever - how did you work it out?"

"They had a new case made for the Stone a few months ago," Sherlock says, not entirely answering the question. "You put mirrors in the seams - very small, very thin and perfectly placed so that they could not be seen, and yet, when you triggered them, they would move to create the illusion that the Rosetta Stone was no longer in the case, whereas, in actuality, it never left."

"Gorgeous," comments Moriarty, on his plot or on Sherlock's deduction, it is not clear.

"You did it just to confuse me," says Sherlock. "Just to hurt me with a case that I thought I could not solve. You were never going to steal it. That wasn't the point."

Moriarty applauds, a slow clap, pacing up the side of the pool with the slow grace of a waiting predator. "Lovely, lovely, _lovely_," he says between each clap. "Oh Sherlock, isn't this _fun?_"

He stops halfway up the side of the pool. Sherlock goes to close the distance, until they are merely an arms length away from each other.

Baker Street, Mrs Hudson, seven thousand people and John Watson stand invisible between them.

They stare at each other. Sherlock can feel time thickening between them, slowing, as this were the end of the world, as if everything else in the world has burnt down in flames and ashes and now only this pool is left, this scene, teetering on the brink of utter destruction, waiting to tip down into the nothing that is waiting on either side. Nowhere else he can go, nothing else he can do.

He looks into Moriarty's eyes, black as coal, black as the nothing. "I am going to kill you," he tells him.

Moriarty pouts in reply. "Oh, now that's no fun," he scolds, as if Sherlock were a small, disobedient child. "Oh _really_, Sherlock. Haven't you realised?"

Sherlock blinks. "Realised."

"Why I'm doing this. Why I killed all of them. The real reason. You don't know?"

"You wanted me to stop," Sherlock says. "To leave you alone."

"Oh, you were never going to stop," Moriarty tuts. "Not for anything or anyone. I _know _you Sherlock. No, no, no. That's what I let you _believe_, but it's not true. Oh no." He steps forward, one more step, and his face is inches from Sherlock, and Sherlock can see into his eyes, can see the madness in the darkness, and it is awful, it is addictive, it is beautiful.

"No, no, no," Moriarty says softly. "I was getting rid of them _for _you, Sherlock."

Sherlock's eyebrows snap together in a frown. "What?"

Moriarty smiles, as if he has given Sherlock present. "You're free now," he says. "You have no heart. I've destroyed it. It's gone. You're free."

It's so cold that Sherlock can barely feel his fingers. "And why," he says slowly, "Would you want to do that?"

Moriarty beams at him. "Because now you can join me," he says.

Sherlock stares at him.

"Oh come on, it's not like you haven't thought of it," continues Moriarty breezily, stepping back, pacing around Sherlock like a hungry lion so that he is behind him. "Like you haven't _dreamed _of it, or wondered about it. Imagine what we could _be_, Sherlock. Can you imagine it? We would take this world over, Sherlock. We would twist and bend and warp it and it would follow our every move. We could _own _it. We could do anything. Together."

A finger, cold at the touch, very gently reaches up and traces the outline of Sherlock's cheekbone. It chills his skin, sends up goosebumps.

"I've helped you," Moriarty says from behind him. "I've got rid of all those little troubles, all those little naggings. Everything that would tell you to ignore me, I've deleted. It's gone. Good_bye_ conscience. Now there is nothing stopping you. You know I'm right, Sherlock."

The finger drags gracefully down to the base of Sherlock's neck.

"We could be _dreadful_," Moriarty whispers.

Sherlock sucks in his breath, the cold air burning his lungs, and then turns, swiftly, steps back, and takes the gun out of the pocket he has been hiding it in.

He levels it, aims it at Moriarty.

Moriarty sighs. "Boooooring, Sherlock."

"You killed him," says Sherlock, completely steadily.

Moriarty rolls his eyes. "Don't pretend you care," he snaps back. "You don't _care_. Not really. All those people died before him, but you didn't care. Oh, maybe you thought you did, maybe you made a show of caring, but you don't _really care_, Sherlock. You want to believe what they all say, what _he _said, that you are as caring as they hope you are, but really, deep down inside, you are as cold and selfish as me, Sherlock, you are _just like me_."

The thing in Sherlock's head, the darkness that whispered _you will forget John Watson_, now whispers _he is right and you know it._

And then, abruptly, suddenly, he thinks of the kiss. Of both kisses really, a kiss while the world burns, and a kiss goodbye. Of the heat and the pressure and home. He thinks of home. It's gone, but it's still there, somehow. It warms him, warms his fingers, warms his body. He is above Moriarty suddenly, above this cold, cruel, calculation. There is something _more_, something he has that Moriarty doesn't. Something filling him up, rising out of the ashes like a phoenix, something _amazing._

He smiles.

Moriarty's face drops into outrage. "I've done everything for you," he snarls. "I've _helped _you! I've done so much so that we can be together, even though you resisted at every turn, I _deserve _you, how dare you - "

"You," says Sherlock. "You have killed John Watson."

"If you kill me," Moriarty says quickly, "What will you do afterwards? I've left you with _nothing_, Sherlock. There is _nothing _left but me. You have no other choice, nowhere else to go and nothing else to do. No more choices! I'm dead, and so is all the crime that you love. Nothing else, except a life of mundanity. Can you imagine it, Sherlock? I think you can. And that's why you haven't shot me yet."

Sherlock's finger, tight on the trigger, lifts up just slightly, and Moriarty smiles, slowly.

"See?" he says. "I'm right."

Sherlock swallows.

"You won't kill me," Moriarty continues. "And I won't kill you. And we'll go on like this _forever_, Sherlock. You and I for all of eternity, chasing and being chased, the whole of the world waiting to be played. This is what the world is, Sherlock, it's our _toy_. That's why it's here. And we should play with it."

"You killed him," Sherlock whispers, from very faraway, he thinks.

"_Play the game,_" Moriarty hisses.

"Moriarty." Sherlock tightens his finger on the trigger. "Game over."

And he fires.

Moriarty was right in one thing; Sherlock _does _cherish the look of surprise on his face.

Moriarty crumples to the ground. Sherlock fires again. Twice. And then stands over him, like some figure of death he imagines, like some winged destroyer, and stares into Moriarty's black, black eyes, and sees nothing but chaos.

Moriarty looks up and him, coughs. Blood runs down his chin. He flashes Sherlock a scarlet smile. "I _win,_" he says.

And then, finally, finally, _finally_, the face goes slack, the black eyes go dull, and Moriarty is gone.

The pool teeters on the edge of nothing. Sherlock closes his eyes and momentarily forgets everything, for a second he is nothing, he is no one, he is no longer Sherlock because everything that made Sherlock _Sherlock_ is gone.

What the hell is he now?

He spins in chaos.

From somewhere, very far away, he hears the door of the pool squeak open.

He opens his eyes, and turns around, and there - not a vision, not an angel, not a demon - stands John.

His breath - he can see it - leaves him in one great gasp of freezing mist.

John does not smile. "Evening," he says.

Sherlock feels his chest jump, and he doesn't know whether what he is squashing is a sob or a laugh. The gun, having been held tightly before, slips out of his fingers and onto Moriarty's blood-splattered chest. He doesn't even notice.

"I'm not dead," says John quickly, as if him standing there isn't proof enough of this. "I'm not, I. It wasn't me. I went to Sarah's, but - I left quickly." He shrugs. "She has a new boyfriend, that was who the body was. I mean, she had. I mean. I wasn't part of her life anymore. I left as soon as I realised that."

Sherlock says nothing.

"I was going to tell you," John says. "When I found out. But then I met Mycroft, I spoke to him, and we thought…we thought maybe, if you thought I was dead, maybe you would do the right thing, Sherlock. I didn't know if you would otherwise. You might have let him go. There was always that possibility. And then it would just start all over again and again, Sherlock, and I couldn't let that happen. Not to you, not to everyone else. Mycroft and I agreed: no more deaths. And we thought, what is one sure-fire way to get rid of an addiction? And that is, to take it away completely. But we couldn't do it, _you _had to do it, to be really free of it. And we thought. If you. If you were _angry_…Do you see, Sherlock?"

Sherlock thinks about mirrors. He thinks about how they can hide the truth. This whole thing has been mirrors, mirrors, mirrors. He opens his mouth, but his words, as well as his identity, seem to have left him entirely. For someone who speaks so much, who knows how to twist and bend words so effortlessly, he is completely dumb. It is quite terrifying.

John's mouth - a mouth that Sherlock thought he would never see again - is twisted unhappily, there is concern in those eyes that can _still_ see, that aren't dead, that aren't forever unseeing.

"God, I'm sorry," he says. "I'm _sorry_, Sherlock."

He rushes up the side of the pool; stops himself before they touch. They stare at each other for a long, silent moment, and then John averts his gaze down to the crumpled bloody nothing that used to be Moriarty.

"But it worked," he says quietly.

When he looks up again, there is a single tear trailing down Sherlock's pale cheek, almost unnoticeable. John watches it wind its way down, lost for words.

Sherlock speaks, a deep, hoarse rattle. "What do I do _now?_" His voice trembles on the last word, breaks, falters. He is lost, he is completely lost.

John bites his lip; thinks. Then he reaches forward and gently swipes the tear away with his thumb.

"Well, I don't know about you," he says quietly, "But I'm _starving_."

Sherlock's face twists, and then he laughs, a short, harsh huff of laughter. John smiles softly. "Chinese?" he says. "And then after that…well, then we'll see. We'll just see."

Sherlock nods. John leans down, takes both Sherlock's hands in his. They are cold, white, alien things, but John's touch, John's fingers curled in between them, manage to make them look and feel normal again. He clings to John and thinks _John, John, John._

John pulls him gently away from the side of the pool, away from the soundless lump of dead flesh beside it, away from the past.

"Come on," he says. "Let's go."

His hands guide Sherlock away.

* * *

When Mycroft and his team arrives, Moriarty's corpse is already cold. He looks at the blank face, thinks about spitting on it, decides against it.

"Clean it up," he says to his team.

He checks his phone as they do so. There are no messages and no Sherlock in sight, but he knows where they are anyway.

Somewhere, not very far away, in a crap Chinese restaurant that is open until some ungodly hour, its neon lights flashing, there are two people, holding hands over the chow mein and the spring rolls, and talking quietly, and occasionally looking at each other as if they are the only thing in the world. That somewhere is nowhere and everywhere. Here there is an end, Mycroft thinks, but there, at that somewhere, there is just starting a new and brighter beginning.

* * *

The End.


End file.
